PPP believes in democracy: Yousuf Raza Gilani

Staff Writer

Islamabad: Former Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) believes in democracy and had supported the move to remove the previous Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI)-led government in a democratic way.

He said that the PTI in its around four years rule had itself been violating human rights and put many leaders of the then opposition parties behind the bars.

Speaking in the Senate this week, he said PTI should accept the reality that it had been ousted from power through a democratic and constitutional process of vote of no-confidence.

“They (PTI) should accept it…they should say that we have lost the majority,” Senator Gilani, a veteran leader of the PPP, said.

Senator Gilani said that PTI in the past had made the capital hostage during its sit-in held in 2014. “There is no way that they protest in Islamabad and hold musical evenings there. The government cannot allow this.”

He said that the PTI should leave the policy of dual standards. When the political parties including MQM, BAP and PML-Q were with them, all were being labelled as patriots and when they left the PTI, they were labelled as traitors, he added.

The former PM said that his father was a signatory to the Resolution of Pakistan and questioned how they can be called traitors.

He said that there should be some limits for PTI because PTI chief Imran Khan had now demanded the resignation of US Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu.

He urged that President Arif Alvi to act on the advice of Prime Minister instead of constantly playing as a PTI activist.