LAHORE (Dunya News/Web Desk) – Rana Sanaullah – a seasoned politician who is the Punjab chapter president of PML-N – on Saturday said they had contested the last general elections with their hands tied – a fact that no one noticed.
Commenting on PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari’s statement about former prime minister Nawaz Sharif in which he said the 70-year-old elder shouldn’t be a prime minister, Rana said Bilawal in that case should also not seek guidance from the same elder.
“Bilawal should wait. The competition would be between the youth when state of affairs improves,” he remarked with a smile at a press conference held at the PML-N headquarters in Lahore.
He noted that those who conspired had introduced a project which resulted in the current worsened situation, a reference to the PTI chairman’s rise to the power. There won’t be any improvement if the nation wasn’t able to adopt the right course of action now, Rana warned.
The PML-N leader said a violent group attacked the state on May 9 and they could not be given a clean chit just because of their desire to contest polls.
Stressing that those involved in violence should face the cases, he said the May 9 violence perpetrators should first apologise for their actions and the nation would hopefully accept that.
The future government must have a five-year mandate, he said – pointing to the repeated removal of elected prime ministers in Pakistan. Any continuation of pulling the strings would make it difficult to move of the prevailing quagmire, Rana added.
About the accountability of those responsible for the current crisis, the PML-N provincial president said they would first put Pakistan on the right track before going for any accountability. Nawaz too was saying that the country should first be on the right track, he told reporters.
Nawaz must be acquitted in the fake cases manufactured against him, he repeated the PML-N’s stance and also added that they would remove any hurdle surfacing in the said cases.
Earlier this week, Rana had said that the constitutional amendment passed by parliament during the coalition government’s tenure had reduced the disqualification period to five years, which meant that the three-time prime minister was eligible to compete in the Feb 8 elections.
The people would decide who was going to get a majority in Balochistan, Rana remarked and promised to take the province along them in the future.
He was also of the view that the PML-N needed a simple majority and making every political party part of the future plans was an objective of Nawaz. They would opt seat adjustment in the constituencies where it was required, the PML-N leader explained the electoral strategy, while also admitting that the former ruling party was in a weaker position in 10 National Assembly constituencies of southern Punjab.