LAHORE: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said on Saturday that the sit-ins staged by the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and the Pakistan Awami Tehreek were part of a “conspiracy” against democracy and warned that no move against democracy would be tolerated.

He was talking to reporters during a visit to the residence of senior journalist Mujibur Rehman Shami, where he had gone to offer condolences to him on his sister’s death.

He said that he could not accept the protesting parties’ demands about which he had no authority. “They are even asking me to dissolve the provincial assemblies which do not come under my authority,” he said, adding that parliament could not be dissolved on anybody’s demand.

“We have accepted their demands for electoral reforms which are also part of PML-N manifesto,” he said. “We have also proposed a commission comprising Supreme Court judges to probe the rigging allegations.”

But the prime minister did not talk about the PTI and PAT’s demand for his resignation. He also avoided commenting on the controversy about the army chief’s role for resolution of the crisis caused by the protesting parties’ sit-ins in Islamabad which entered the 17th day on Saturday.

He had said in the National Assembly on Friday that he had not sought the army chief’s intervention to break the deadlock in talks with the protesting parties. But, the army’s media wing, Inter-Services Public Relations, contradicted the premier’s statement and said that the government had asked Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif to ‘facilitate’ negotiations with the PTI and the PAT.

A source in the PML-N told Dawn that the premier had deliberately avoided commenting on the controversy. “As the government has already faced criticism from its allies and the media on the issue, more words from Mr Sharif could have deepened the crisis,” he said.

Mocking the claims about a ‘roaring sea of people’ in the federal capital, the prime minister said: “Everyone is seeing the roaring sea of empty chairs in Islamabad. Everyone is witnessing how many people are in the sit-ins. They are a mini-storm. In fact this is not a storm but a tumultuous situation which will end in a few days. ”

A few thousand people could not take the mandate of millions hostage, he said. The government would not allow the protesters to take parliament hostage.

Smelling a rat in the twin protests of the PTI and the PAT, he said: “I don’t know what made Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri to stage sit-ins in Islamabad on the same day. Perhaps they had dreamt about marching on Islamabad together.”

Mr Sharif tried to figure out what went wrong of late. “All was good when I visited Imran Khan in Bani Gala and held a discussion with him on all issues. But suddenly everything changed. The people will soon come to know everything about it,” he said.

Talking about the financial impact of the crisis, he said that economic activity in the country had suffered a lot because of the protests. “Development projects have been adversely affected by the sit-ins. Besides, the presidents of Sri Lanka and Maldives have called off their visits to Pakistan. The Chinese president is coming here to inaugurate energy projects and his visit may also be hampered because of the sit-ins.”

Meanwhile, the prime minister held a meeting with Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif at their Raiwind residence and discussed the strategy to deal with the crisis.

Published in Dawn, August 31th, 2014