'PTI talks failed over terror clause'

PPP leader blames Afridi for veto, criticises PTI's governance

PESHAWAR:

Ninety-eight per cent of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's negotiations with the federal government had succeeded, but Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi objected to the clause on action against terrorists and vetoed the talks, Pakistan Peoples Party K-P President Muhammad Ali Shah Bacha said on Thursday.

Addressing a press conference at the Peshawar Press Club along with other party leaders, Bacha said that in the previous day's cabinet meeting, Asif Ali Zardari and Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, leaders of the country's most popular political party, the PPP, which had provided the forum for those negotiations, were subjected to severe criticism. "They should have been thanked in the cabinet meeting, but that did not happen," he said.

Bacha accused the chief minister, who launched his long march from areas under terrorist siege and is touring the province from a container, of now convening cabinet meetings solely for criticism. He said the chief minister had targeted those who facilitated talks with the Centre, levelled harsh criticism against the governor, and opposed the meeting in which Governor Faisal Karim Kundi received a briefing from institutions on law and order.

The meeting should have been called a month earlier, Bacha argued, because PTI is not sincere towards K-P. "The situation in the province is extremely precarious. In such circumstances the Constitution allows the governor to play his role, but the PTI chief minister is completely unfamiliar with the Constitution."

He claimed that under the banner of a long march the convoy is now circling different cities of the province under the chief minister's leadership from a container, and "it seems this caravan will also tour Afghanistan." This, he said, is the same terrorism that the PPP has consistently opposed, the terrorism that martyred Benazir Bhutto and eight of the party's MPAs.

The PPP, Bacha said, speaks for the survival of parliament and advises the chief minister to study the Constitution. "In the past 13 years the PTI government in K-P has delivered nothing. It remains absorbed only in Imran Khan's narrative and has no interest in the problems of the people. Today our soldiers and police personnel are sacrificing their lives fighting terrorists for the country's survival, while these people are misleading the youth. On the other hand the public is making sacrifices because of terrorists. Unemployment is widespread in K-P and corruption is at its peak; contracts worth billions of rupees are being awarded to favourites for crores."

He held PTI's leadership primarily responsible for the deterioration of the province's political situation and warned that if any political change occurs in K-P, full responsibility would rest with PTI and the chief minister.