PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Saturday accused PPP of “sacrificing everything” for a “minor, inconsequential office”.
A day earlier, PPP had gathered 30 senators and gone ahead to secure the position for its candidate, Yousaf Raza Gillani, without the PDM’s blessing.
The numbers comprised 21 senators from the PPP itself, 2 senators from the Awami National Party, 1 senator of the Jamaat-i-Islami, 2 independents from FATA and a group of 4 ‘independents’ led by Senator Dilawar Khan that had broken away from the Balochistan Awami Party to support Gillani’s candidature.
“I am glad that they are now calling the PDM’s narrative, Maryam Nawaz’s narrative,” Maryam said at the beginning of her press conference.
“Our narrative is out there for the entire country to see. It is Nawaz Sharif’s narrative; it is the narrative of democracy, of law and the Constitution,” she said.
Maryam said that she was waiting for PDM President Maulana Fazlur Rahman to make his position on this matter known.
“This is not the PDM’s defeat, of which the PML-N remains a part. It is the defeat of the people who sacrificed their principles for an inconsequential office,” Maryam said.
“What good is a leader of opposition anyway? It’s not like we could have formed a government with it even if the PML-N got the post. This is a very meaningless, very transitionary victory, and I regret that for this small gain, you have taken votes from the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP).”
Maryam went on to claim that the PML-N’s candidate for opposition leader in the Senate, Azam Nazeer Tarar, had received a phone call from Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani offering him the support of three or four BAP senators for his candidature.
“He [Tarar] told him I don’t need your votes. I am with my party and my party has a position which I will not betray. I cannot betray the PDM.”
“This is the first time in Pakistan’s 73-year history — probably in the history of the entire world, that the leader of the opposition has been elected — rather selected — by government senators.”
Maryam went on to allege that PPP co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari offered a deal to the PML-N of regime change in Punjab.
She said Zardari had “made this offer inside the PDM that if PML-N wants, then we [PPP], because selectors also want this, want [regime change] in Punjab”.
Maryam said that the Prime Minister Imran Khan was backing Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar while the “selectors” wanted change.
“They said if the PML-N and PDM accept, then we can bring change in Punjab though a vote of no confidence [against the Punjab chief minister] and make [Chaudhry] Pervaiz Elahi or someone else the chief minister.”
She went on to say that PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif had rejected the offer and gave a “clear answer” that he would not sacrifice his principles or work together with the “selectors” to attain political power.
Maryam said if the PPP “wanted this position and wanted it so badly then you should’ve asked Nawaz Sharif and he would’ve given it — like he had provided support for Gilani in the Senate elections and for the Senate chairman”.
She said the PPP thought that there was no path available for it to attain political power except for being “selected”, adding that now everyone could see who stood where and what their real positions were.
