ISLAMABAD: Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the leader of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), has called all opposition activists to arrive in Islamabad on March 25 in the evening.
“The foreign ministers of the OIC (Organisation of Islamic Cooperation) are our guests, and it is our responsibility to respect them because they will be in Islamabad until March 24,” Fazl remarked after a meeting of the Opposition parties.
On Pakistan Day, March 23, the PDM chairman had called for the entire country to “march” towards Islamabad in order to stage a major anti-government rally.
However, the PDM leader stated today that the Opposition does not “want” for problems to emerge during the OIC foreign ministers’ visit to Pakistan.
“The protests — which are coming from all over Pakistan — should not enter Islamabad on March 23,” Fazl added, referring to his announcement the day before, which had enraged the administration.
Fazl said the allies will soon cut ways with the government in answer to a question concerning Punjab Assembly Speaker Pervaiz Elahi’s statement. “By tomorrow, the picture will be clearer.”
In response to Prime Minister Imran Khan’s no-confidence motion, Pervaiz Elahi told Hum News that all of the PTI’s allies are “100% inclined” to support the opposition.
“It is Khan Sahab’s responsibility to correct the imbalance. However, I believe the time has passed for sending delegations [to ensure support]. This could have been averted if he had done it earlier “In the Centre and Punjab, the speaker’s party is an ally of the PTI.
Just weeks before a vote on Prime Minister Imran Khan’s no-confidence motion, the speaker described the alliance of the three major Opposition parties — JUI-F, PML-N, and PPP — as long-lasting and stable.
The Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA), the government’s biggest ally in the Centre, guaranteed Prime Minister Imran Khan of unequivocal support ahead of the no-trust motion on Monday, but other allies — the BAP, MQM-P, and PML-Q — remain undecided.
BAP Parliamentary Leader in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Parliament Bilawal Afridi had declared severing his party’s coalition with the PTI in the provincial assembly just hours before Fazl’s press conference.
“In the no-confidence motion, we (BAP) would not support the administration,” Afridi told PTI, which has a comfortable majority of 94 in the 145-member provincial legislature.
As the clock ticks down on the session for the no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Imran Khan, he also stated that the party would dissolve its affiliation with the PTI in Balochistan, the National Assembly, and the Senate in a video statement.
