Lahore: Pakistan’s main opposition PML-N party has stepped up efforts to woo other parties to forge a “grand political alliance” and oust the PPP-led government at the centre. After PML-N President and Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman is travelling to London to meet Muttahidda Qaumi Movement (MQM) head Altaf Hussain to discuss the idea of the proposed grand alliance.
The MQM, which recently quit the PPP-led ruling coalition, has ruled out taking part in efforts to oust the government. At the same time, MQM leaders have said that their party can sit with the PML-N in Parliament to pressure the government to provide relief to the people.
Former federal minister Ishaq Dar, a close aide of PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif, said efforts for establishing the grand opposition alliance, especially contacts with the MQM, were already underway.
“There are, and should be, contacts with all political parties for setting up a grand opposition alliance,” Dar said. He listed the “bad economic, political and law and order situation” as the main reason for different political forces coming together on a common platform to steer Pakistan out of a crisis. Dar said opposition parties will have to play an active role in the current circumstances. “Contacts are being made to bring together the opposition parties under a single umbrella,” he said.
There was speculation in political circles that Dar had held talks with MQM leaders during a recent visit to in Dubai to improve relations between the MQM and PML-N, which have been frozen for over a decade.
Dar confirmed that there had been contacts between the PML-N and the MQM though no formal meetings between leaders of the two parties had yet been planned.
He said he could not say at this point whether the MQM would join the grand opposition alliance. However, any PML-N-MQM alliance or political cooperation might create fissures in the former as there is a strong group in Nawaz Sharif’s party that has been critical of the Karachi-based MQM’s style of politics.
But Dar referred to past criticism of the MQM and said bitter memories of the past will have to be buried to save Pakistan. The PML-N would also benefit from a tie-up with the MQM in the Senate, especially if the MQM decides to support Ishaq Dar as the leader of opposition in the upper house of the bicameral parliament. (PTI)