Senior Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) leader Aitzaz Ahsan sought to refute the notion on Tuesday that he would “become the Javed Hashmi of PPP”, but hailed Hashmi as a leader of high calibre. Ahsan said in his address at Naudero on the 4th death anniversary of former premier Benazir Bhutto that the loss of Hashmi, a former Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader who recently joined the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI), would cause the PML-N to suffer. However, he made it clear that he would not become the Javed Hashmi of the PPP and would stick with the party. “Don’t term my speech Javed Hashmi’s speech of Faisalabad,” he said, adding that Hashmi should not have left his party. Ahsan criticised PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi for speaking against President Asif Ali Zardari after leaving the PPP and also tried to get the party leadership to realise that the people were suffering at the hands of poverty and there was no gas and electricity for them and the party had done nothing for them. The leadership of the ruling party – facing a hostile establishment and a not-so-friendly judiciary in the wake of the memo crisis – has decided to bank on the legal and political acumen of Ahsan, sources said.
Aitzaz says he will not become ‘the Hashmi of PPP’
