Fresh strategy?: PML-N demands creation of Potohar province
PML-N says carving out only two provinces while ignoring people of Potohar was unwarranted.
LAHORE:
As a parliamentary commission, formed to carve out two new provinces out of Punjab, sat down for the first time on Tuesday, members of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) submitted a resolution in the Punjab Assembly for the creation of yet another province – Potohar.
The tit-for-tat move to counter the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) decision to go ahead with the parliamentary commission formed by National Assembly Speaker on August 16, mandated to reinstate the province of Bahawalpur and to carve out a province out of southern Punjab, is likely to spark a new debate between the opposition and the government.
Several MPAs belonging to PML-N and the Unification Bloc of Pakistan Muslim League Rawalpindi division submitted the resolution, which demands that the federal government form a national commission for the formation of Potohar province, with the Punjab Assembly (PA) secretariat.
Chaudhry Sarfraz Afzal of the PML-N from PP-6 Rawalpindi, who submitted the resolution, told The Express Tribune that he would press the Punjab Assembly Speaker to take up and pass the resolution urgently.
Afzal said that the people of Potohar were deprived of basic necessities and water despite having abundant resources at their disposal such as coal reserves in Chakwal and oil in Attock, Rawalpindi and Jehlum.
Decrying the ‘injustice’ of the parliamentary commission, the PML-N member said carving out only two provinces while ignoring the people of Potohar was unwarranted.
The army chief, director-general of ISI, leader of opposition in the National Assembly, Senate chairman and even the incumbent prime minister hailed from the Potohar region, Afzal added while making a rather unusual case for the formation of a separate province.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 29th, 2012.
As a parliamentary commission, formed to carve out two new provinces out of Punjab, sat down for the first time on Tuesday, members of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) submitted a resolution in the Punjab Assembly for the creation of yet another province – Potohar.
The tit-for-tat move to counter the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) decision to go ahead with the parliamentary commission formed by National Assembly Speaker on August 16, mandated to reinstate the province of Bahawalpur and to carve out a province out of southern Punjab, is likely to spark a new debate between the opposition and the government.
Several MPAs belonging to PML-N and the Unification Bloc of Pakistan Muslim League Rawalpindi division submitted the resolution, which demands that the federal government form a national commission for the formation of Potohar province, with the Punjab Assembly (PA) secretariat.
Chaudhry Sarfraz Afzal of the PML-N from PP-6 Rawalpindi, who submitted the resolution, told The Express Tribune that he would press the Punjab Assembly Speaker to take up and pass the resolution urgently.
Afzal said that the people of Potohar were deprived of basic necessities and water despite having abundant resources at their disposal such as coal reserves in Chakwal and oil in Attock, Rawalpindi and Jehlum.
Decrying the ‘injustice’ of the parliamentary commission, the PML-N member said carving out only two provinces while ignoring the people of Potohar was unwarranted.
The army chief, director-general of ISI, leader of opposition in the National Assembly, Senate chairman and even the incumbent prime minister hailed from the Potohar region, Afzal added while making a rather unusual case for the formation of a separate province.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 29th, 2012.