Nawaz in favour of change

[Lahore_Real_Estate]

LAHORE (September 17 2010): While supporting a political change through Constitutional ways and means, the PML-N Chief has floated the idea of a 'Charter of Pakistan' with a view to drawing a grand strategy for the next 25 years.

"All the stakeholders as well as writers, civil society people, media men should sit together to prepare agenda for the next 25 years under Charter of Pakistan and come out after preparing a comprehensive agenda. The next elections should be held under this agenda and the elected government that will come into power as a result of these polls must be allowed to complete its five-year term," Nawaz said.

Addressing a gathering of writers, poets, intellectuals and columnists here at Alhamra Arts Centre on Thursday, the PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif, however, said that the government should be impressed upon to put its house in order through good governance, eradication of terrorism and resolution of public issues such as load shedding, unemployment and price hike. "If the government is not ready to pay any heed to these demands, only the way of bringing change in a constitutional way be taken up," he stressed. He added that we would have to talk about "change" only through Constitutional ambit instead of any extra constitutional way.

Nawaz, who was in a pleasant mood, shared his miseries during Musharraf regime and said he has no personal grudge against the former dictator but he should be tried for the murder of Akbar Bugti, and disregarding the constitution. The person who caused great harm to the country as well as nation must be held accountable of his misdeeds, Nawaz added.

He said the country suffered unprecedented losses during dictatorship. "The country was dismembered during dictatorship while the person who got released 90,000 prisoners was hanged while the person who got them arrested was laid to rest with full official protocol," he said.

The PML-N leader said he is in favour of a "soft revolution" in the country and for this purpose he is ready to launch long march like the one that was taken out for the restoration of judges. He regretted that efforts are being made to weaken democracy in the country.

Referring to discussions about the possible imposition of Martial Law, Nawaz said, "It is sad to note that when there is democracy in the country, talks about Martial Law start and when there is Martial Law, we start demanding democracy." He said that martial caused split in the country and it also caused harm to the institutions.

According to him, India's high progress is not due to its status of being a nuclear power; it is because of the fact that the country is the biggest democracy in the world. He also referred to the recent visit of British Prime Minister to India. According to him, a failure of democratic government should not be termed a failure of democracy.

Paying tributes to Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz regretted that the PPP-led government failed to implement the Charter of Democracy (CoD). He said that non-implementation of CoD created manifold problems for the government. He said that 18th Constitutional Amendment was passed only for the sake of democracy. He said that it was the time to make joint efforts to get Pakistan out of present situation. He said he and Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto decided to form Truth and Reconciliation Commission for rule of law in the country but regretfully no headway was made to implement the CoD.

Nawaz urged the writers, poets and intellectuals to prepare suggestions to steer the country out of prevailing situation. Atta ul Haq Qasmi, Senator Pervaiz Rasheed, Mustafa Qureshi, Usman Pirzada, Asgher Nadeem Syed and a good number of artists of film, TV and stage attended the function.