Starting fresh: PPP calls for dissolution of party organisations in K-P

Special committee suggests steps to restore party workers’ trust.

PESHAWAR:

Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) chapter on Saturday endorsed its special committee’s suggestion to dissolve all party organisations in the province and to re-elect office bearers through intra-party elections.

Addressing a press conference at Peshawar Press Club (PPC), PPP central leader Liaqat Shabab said the party had appointed a committee to come up with suggestions on how the trust of party workers can be restored in the wake of the May 11 general elections. It also delved into how to make the party a political force to be reckoned with. The committee was headed by Engineer Humayun Khan. Its members include Abdul Akbar Khan, Rahimdad Khan and other senior leaders.

Flanked by PPP leaders Zulfiqar Afghani, Ayub Shah and Shazia Aurangzeb, Shabab said the committee’s report was endorsed during PPP’s K-P cabinet meeting on Friday. Participants of the meeting suggested dissolution of all organisations in the province and to hold fresh intra-party elections. “Now we are awaiting the decision of the central leadership,” added Shabab.

The provincial cabinet of PPP under Anwar Saifullah Khan also discussed the upcoming local bodies elections in the province, said Shabab. “The cabinet decided to nominate five conveners at divisional level and one at the local level in Peshawar city to decide how the party will contest the upcoming elections,” he added.

Shabab informed Azam Khan Afridi had been nominated as the convener for Peshawar division, Sher Azam Wazir for southern district region, Ahmad Hasan Khan for Malakand division, Shamroz Khan for Hazara division and Abdus Samad Khan for Mardan division. Zulfiqar Afghani will work as the party convener for Peshawar city area.

“The conveners have been fully authorised to form their own committees and have the power to form an alliance with any political party they deem fit as coalition partners for the upcoming local bodies elections in K-P,” he added.

He said the conveners will also have the power to nominate candidates in their respective areas who will be endorsed by the central leadership for the elections.

The PPP leader spoke about a unanimously passed resolution asking the central leadership to fully empower the provincial president to help discipline party ranks. It has also asked the incumbent government to reinstate the ‘Police Shuhada Package’ initiated by the previous government to help out family members of policemen killed in the line of duty.

The PPP provincial cabinet passed another resolution expressing its dissatisfaction over the incumbent rulers, both at the centre and in K-P, being unsuccessful in bringing peace to the region. Shabab said the cabinet maintained the federal and K-P governments do not have any strategy for initiating dialogue with militants and the PPP leadership does not believe the incumbent rulers will achieve any success in this regard.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 29^th, 2013.