The PPP, while dismissing rumours about President Asif Ali Zardari's possible removal, appeared uneasy over the frequency with which such speculation surfaces in mainstream media. Some party members suspect a hidden agenda behind the recurring discussions about the president's fate.
The latest rumour suggested that PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif wished to become president himself.
When asked about the speculation during a private TV talk show, PML-N Senator Irfanul Haque Siddiqui rejected it as a baseless "table story." However, he added that no political position is permanent, saying, "We cannot comment today on what might happen tomorrow."
A leader, who had the opportunity to interact with him during those days, said that even when leaders in the party used to say the rumours were baseless and unfounded, Zardari took it as a smoke that is never without fire. He was uneasy and wanted clarity over it, the source further said. On both the occasion, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi denied the speculations.
PPP Central Secretary Information Nadeem Afzal Chan talking to The Express Tribune said that there was no truth to the unfounded media speculation. He said that removing the president was not a walk in the park. "There is a strenuous constitutional mechanism that has to be adopted to impeach the president, that as things stand, even if there was any desire within PMLN, they just do not have the teeth to do it."
He said the PML-N leaders should abstain from reminding the president of his constitutional limits, because when the PPP takes them up on offer and hold a mirror to them, they would start whimpering.
A PPP leader said that there was a premediated effort to keep the party under pressure. He said it has happened one to many times to ignore them as some desperate attention seekers' afterthought. He said if some think that the PPP will budge from its position, then they are badly mistaken. He speculated that either the PML-N or Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi was behind the rumours. He said Naqvi has big ambition, and to get to this goal nothing was off limits.
Attempts were made to reach out to Senator Irfan Saddique, but was of no avail.
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