ISLAMABAD: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari said on Friday that all institutions should work within their constitutional limits.
In a message on the eve of the International Democracy Day celebrated on September 15, the former president stressed the need to promote the rule of law, transparency, across the board accountability and tolerance of dissent in the country’s current scenario. He also called for “respecting constitutional limits by all institutions”.
“Threats to democracy have changed with time,” the former president said.
He said: “There was a time when democracy was directly assaulted and this assault protected by devices like the doctrine of necessity, the legal framework orders (LFOs), provisional constitutional orders (PCOs) upheld by PCO judges.”
Zardari said that the country’s democracy is under threat from the militants and extremists who wish to impose their agenda by force and not through the parliament.
“The celebrations today should also enhance peoples’ awareness of the new forms of threats to democracy and the need to guard against them,” he said.
The former president paid glowing tributes to Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Shaheed Benazir Bhutto as icons of democracy and countless political leaders and workers belonging to different political parties who rendered huge sacrifices for the cause of democracy.
