PPP to field Bilawal Bhutto for PM, Zardari for President: Faisal Karim Kundi

Liaquat Ali

Islamabad: PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari will stand for the coveted role of prime minister while his father and former president Asif Ali Zardari will be the nominee for president in the upcoming polls, party information secretary Faisal Karim Kundi said on Thursday.

His statement comes days after Zardari indicated that the party had yet to finalise who it would field for the role of the premier.

He had said the next prime minister could be from the PPP and that time would tell who it would be when questioned if it could be Bilawal.

“Bilawal can be the [candidate] and I can be too … Khurshid Shah also says he can be made [the prime minister],” he had stated.

Speaking to the media in Islamabad, Kundi confirmed that Bilawal will be the candidate for the seat of prime minister.

“Our wish will be that we replay 2018 [scenario] and make Asif Zardari the president,” he added, possibly referring to the 2008 elections when Zardari was elected as the president.

The leader also reiterated the party’s oft-voiced stance that the elections “should not be delayed” beyond Feb 8, 2024 after Zardari said that a delay of “eight to 10 days” would make no difference.

“It is better than selection and becoming a laadla (favourite) that we sit in the opposition,” Kundi said in an apparent reference to PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif.

Terming former ally PML-N’s politics as “drawing room politics”, the PPP leader wondered why the “party that calls itself the country’s biggest is running away from elections”.

“If a party is this big, then why does it talk about delay of two months in the elections?” he asked.

Kundi asserted that a comparison of rallies held by Nawaz and his daughter and PML-N Chief Organiser Maryam to those held by Bilawal would show that the nation was with the PPP.

The politician affirmed that his party was “fully ready” for the general elections.

Referring to reports of a ban on the use of social media during elections, he said it would be “against freedom of expression” as the public had the right to express their opinions.

Speaking about Nawaz’s recent acquittals in graft cases, Kundi said the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had always been used for “political engineering”.

“The same NAB used to make cases against Nawaz Sharif and is now acquitting him one after another,” he remarked.

“The public should be informed whether the NAB was wrong in the past or is wrong today. The NAB is not anyone’s property but an institution.”

Condemning the recent terror incident in which 23 soldiers got martyred after militants stormed a compound used by the military in Dera Ismail Khan, the PPP leader said the party had been urging for implementation of the National Action Plan.

Echoing his party chairman’s recent remarks, Kundi asked, “Who resettled terrorists in the country and brought them here? On whose directives were they set free?”

Speaking about the presidential reference taken up by the Supreme Court after more than a decade, the politician said Zulfikar Ali Bhutto “should be served justice”.

“Those involved in martyring Bhutto should be punished, whether they are bureaucrats, judges or lawyers,” he added.