KARACHI – If a warrant can be issued against former president General (retd) Pervez Musharraf in the Benazir Bhutto murder case, then President Asif Ali Zardari can also be summoned by the court for assisting the former military ruler flee the country, Sindh National Front (SNF) chief Mumtaz Ali Bhutto said in a statement issued on Monday.
“Under the criminal law of the country, a person who aids the escape of an accused is also guilty for the same offence,” he said, adding that President Zardari could be issued a warrant as he provided protection to Musharraf while the latter was in the country after stepping down as president and later also helped him escape the country. Bhutto praised senior PPP leader and former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi for sacrificing a ministry on the basis of principles.
“Nobody can do that in the current political culture,” he said, adding that generally, the politicians of the present culture are always ready to do everything against their ideology and principles. The SNF chief also criticised the PPP government for failing to rehabilitate the flood survivors of the province. He said that even as more floods are expected within three months, around 10 million people affected in the recent floods are still waiting for rehabilitation.
Six months after the worst floods in the history of Pakistan, aid agencies say that millions are still in dire need of assistance, and there are new warnings about malnutrition in Sindh, but money donated to the prime minister’s relief fund has still not been spent. The UN had recently said that the situation in Sindh still required the attention of the global community and urged it to go beyond the relief and recovery phase and help reconstruct the devastated areas.
