Confusion continues to swirl within the PPP over its purported plans to stage a nationwide protest against the federal budget, as conflicting voices emerge from within the party's ranks.
While some insiders deny any such plan, others maintain that a strategy was indeed in the works, but mainly being driven by the party's Punjab wing, as the central party has not been fully engaged in the decision.
The Pakistan Peoples Party, whose senior leader Chaudhary Manzoor announced a countrywide protest against the budget draft, remains a key coalition partner in the federal government.
Without its backing, the PML-N-led government would be left out on a limb. Any official protest call by the party's central leadership would signal a withdrawal of support for the finance bill, throwing the budget's passage into serious doubt.
However, party leaders The Express Tribune spoke to suggested that Manzoor's call was more of a solo flight than a coordinated party line. While some leaders in central Punjab are rallying behind it, the move has not received a formal green light from the party's top brass.
According to insiders, the protest plan was being shaped as an attempt to tap into the growing discontent among farmers and labourers who were being left high and dry by the government's policies.
The party, by reaching out to farmers and labourers, would try to gather support before embarking on any protest plan, as it lacks sufficient muscle in Punjab to hit the roads without them.
Senior Vice President Central Punjab Rana Farooq Saeed said they had not been informed by the party about any protest plan. He questioned under whose authority Manzoor had made the call.
However, he added that the party does not approve of the budget, as it offered nothing for farmers and labourers. "It would be wrong to even call it a budget," he said. However, despite these reservations, the party has yet to take a formal decision.
"Given that we are allies in the centre, we cannot give out impulsive statements against the budget," he said.
Central Party General Secretary Hasan Murtaza avoided giving a direct answer regarding any party plans to hold a protest demonstration throughout the country.
He said they were allies of the government and would try to knock some sense into the PML-N over the glaring discrepancies in the budget. If dialogue failed, he added, they would ultimately hit the roads.
When asked if the central party had rejected the budget, which would mean the PPP would withhold support, he said that decision would be taken by the central leadership. However, he clarified that the party would not "stand in for PML-N's mistakes".
"They will not carry their weight while they suck the life out of poor people and line their own pockets," he said.
He listed several grievances, from the failure to renegotiate capacity payments to the taxation of solar panels.
When asked about senior leader Naveed Qamar's acknowledgement of thorough consultation sessions with the PML-N on the budget, he responded that "consultation does not mean that their inputs are being incorporated".
On Thursday, several media outlets reported that the PPP had rejected the federal budget for the upcoming fiscal year and announced a nationwide protest campaign against it.
The impression was formed after Chaudhary Manzoor Ahmad, who heads the PPP's People's Labour Bureau, lambasted the federal government at a press conference in Islamabad for presenting a budget that favours the wealthy and ignores the miseries of the working class and poor.
The PPP leader said the party had started contacting trade unions across the country to mobilise support for protest demonstrations. He stated that demonstrations would be held in all provinces before the passage of the federal budget in the National Assembly.
When senior PPP leader Naveed Qamar was asked to comment on the budget, he said the party recognised that the government was walking a tightrope under the IMF programme.
However, he also said the government's policies were misaligned and that if the PPP were designing the budget, it would have been vastly different.
At no point during the programme did he outright reject the budget or announce plans for protest rallies.
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