LAHORE, Sept 4: In an apparent reference to some PML-N leaders’ demand that the Pakistan People’s Party should quit the Punjab government after the coalition breakup at the Centre, Governor Salman Taseer has warned that the provincial government will not survive if the PPP ministers resign.

Without mentioning names, he also warned that he would not tolerate horse-trading in the province during the presidential polls. He was replying to questions put up by the media during an Iftar dinner thrown by Punjab Finance Minister Tanvir Ashraf Kaira for the PPP members in the Punjab Assembly on Thursday. Adviser to Prime Minister Manzoor Ahmad Wattoo also attended it.

Mr Taseer said as long as the federal government sustained, there would be no threat to the provincial setup. Regarding the presidential polls, he said though the PPP had 107 MPAs in the Punjab Assembly, its nominee Asif Zardari would bag much more votes as many parliamentarians of other parties too had assured the PPP co-chairperson of their support. The governor asked the parliamentarians to cast their votes on the call of their conscience as he would not tolerate horse-trading or any sort of pressure on MPs from any quarter.

Ata Muhammad Maneka, an MPA who is a PML-Q forward bloc leader, chided the governor’s remarks and said the allegation of horse-trading was true about Mr Taseer’s party, says a TV report. He claimed that the PPP had approached them with ‘big offers’ in a bid to win the bloc’s support for Mr Zardari.

Senior Minister Raja Riaz said Zardari wanted to take along all the political forces to bring about a change in the lives of the masses by doing away with the prevailing system.

“The PPP is doing politics to save the country,” he said, urging the parliamentarians to broaden their thinking and support the PPP which he said was striving for a Pakistan as envisioned by the late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.