Islamabad: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party leaders said they would not accept any interim government setup that is formed for an extended time in the country.
PTI leader and former prime minister Imran Khan rejected the alleged move to set up an interim government of technocrats for two and a half years and postpone elections in the country. Imran Khan told reporters that the rumours about bringing in a caretaker government for an extended period indicate that the coalition government “is not interested in holding general elections anytime soon.”
Khan losing hope for snap polls
Imran Khan, who has been holding massive rallies to demand snap elections since his ouster in April this year, says he is losing hopes for early elections in the country. Talking to reporters at his Lahore residence, Khan again rejected talks with the ruling coalition. Khan, however, repeated his calls for early elections and added: “It is more important to convince those forces that are backing the PDM government than the government itself to call early elections.” Imran Khan has reiterated that the “country needs urgent elections” to ensure political stability, regain investor confidence and support the economy.
No room for any extended caretaker setup in the constitution
Meanwhile, another top PTI leader and Khan’s aide, Asad Umar said that his party would not accept any extended interim government setup which will be against the spirit of the constitution and that “PTI cannot accept the extended interim government as a political party that believes in democracy and constitution”. He said the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) should fulfil its constitutional responsibility of holding polls within 90 days after assemblies are dissolved.
Another PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry said: “We will fully condemn [the idea of] extended technocratic government. A system beyond the Constitution is not acceptable to us under any circumstances.”
The PTI reaction came after former Federal Bureau of Revenue (FBR) chairman, Shabbar Zaidi, said in a TV interview that Pakistan’s power corridors were discussing the possibility of bringing in a caretaker government for an extended period to resolve the economic crisis.
PTI resignations
On Thursday, a high-level PTI delegation led by former speaker Asad Qaiser held a meeting with current National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf and urged him to accept all 127 resignations tendered by PTI members of parliament and refer it to ECP to declare those seats vacant for by-elections. They stressed that all resignations were rendered within the constitution and parliamentary procedures and should be accepted without any delay. The speaker Pervez Ashraf told the PTI delegation that the party’s lawmakers would be summoned individually for verification of their resignations and not collectively. The PTI had announced mass resignations from the National Assembly in April, a day after party chief Imran Khan’s ouster as the prime minister through a no-confidence vote.
