A file photo of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. PHOTO: AFP
ISLAMABAD:
The ruling PML-N’s senior leadership has expressed its reservations over the party’s policy regarding the upcoming local government (LG) elections in the country’s cantonment boards as it has left the field open for the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) in the party’s core constituency in order to counter the PTI factor, sources told The Express Tribune on Wednesday.
Sources revealed that although Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has approved PML-N’s policy for the LG polls in the cantonment areas to be held on April 25, the senior leadership expressed concern over the party’s strategy to give the JI a free hand with an idea to undercut PTI’s votebank in the country’s urban centres, particularly in Punjab.
In Punjab, the LG elections will be held in Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Kharian, Gujranwala, Lahore, Sialkot, Okara, Multan and Bahawalpur. Sources said the PML-N would not issue tickets to its candidates, adding that the party believed that under the LG laws, a political party was free whether or not to contest the elections with its symbol. The PML-N chose not to use its symbol, they added.
According to details, the PML-N has devised its strategy for the LG polls across the country, and at the preliminary level the party has marked the PTI as its main opponent.
The PML-N has tasked Hamza Shahbaz Sharif to ensure the party’s candidates win all the seats in the cantonment areas in Punjab. Similarly, in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Governor Sardar Mehtab and Pir Sabir Shah; in Balochistan Federal Minister Abdul Qadir Baloch, Sardar Yaqoob Khan Nasir and Sardar Sanaullah Khan Zehri have been tasked to achieve the party’s targets in the LG elections in their respective provinces.
Interestingly, the ruling PML-N ignored the Sindh province as the party could not find any suitable leader for its election campaign.
According to sources, the PML-N is fixated on Punjab as it is the key battleground where it would face the PTI threat in every electoral fight, whether at the national level or local. They pointed out that Hamza Shahbaz, along with Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, assigned their MNAs and MPAs who won their seats from the cantonment areas to help the party leadership in finalising candidates for the LG polls.
JI-PTI factor
According to sources, some senior PML-N members are not convinced with their party’s strategy to let the JI launch its campaign in Lahore Division and other parts of the province. They said the JI has kicked off its campaign in Punjab for the LG elections and according to its plan it would not make any alliance with the PTI. Such an alliance is only at the K-P level, not Punjab, they added.
The senior leadership, including Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, said that the JI’s move is an effort to fill the vacuum created by banned outfits and other religious organisations which came under the government’s National Action Plan.
The senior leadership urged the party to restrict the JI and keep an eye on its activities, particularly in Punjab, as it might damage PML-N’s votebank.
Sources said that the collective efforts of the PPP and the PML-Q could not dent PML-N’s votebak in the previous elections – but the PTI managed to mobilise the youth in the province. Both the JI and PTI are focusing on the youth and they might damage the PML-N votebank in Punjab, they added.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 26th, 2015.
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