The Pakistan president, Asif Ali Zardari, has said that he forged an alliance with PML-N leaders Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif after the 2008 general election only to send then military ruler Pervez Musharraf packing, reports Hindustan Times (an Indian English-language daily newspaper).
‘I gave concessions to the Sharif brothers to get rid of Musharraf,’
Zardari said while interacting with newspaper editors and workers of his Pakistan People’s Party at the Governor’s House in Lahore on Saturday evening.
He further said: ‘The Sharifs have stiff necks and I know how to humble them.’
Zardari, who has been camping in the capital of Punjab province for the past few days, appears to have kicked off the PPP’s campaign for the 2013 general election by targeting former premier Nawaz Sharif and his brother, Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif.
Following the fractured mandate in the 2008 general election, the PPP and PML-N formed a short-lived coalition at the centre.
The alliance ended within six months after Nawaz Sharif accused Zardari of failing to deliver on several promises.
The PPP continues to lead the ruling coalition at the centre while the PML-N rules Punjab, the country’s most populous province.
During Friday’s interaction, Zardari said the PPP would form the government in Punjab after the 2013 polls because the people would reject the Sharif brothers for their ‘arrogant’ politics.
‘The Sharifs’ PML-N does not have a majority in Punjab but we never tried to topple their government,’ he said.
Zardari asked PPP workers to begin preparing for the upcoming elections.
He told them he would visit all divisions of Punjab before the polls to strengthen the PPP in the province.
The PPP usually comes to power in hard times and the party’s government at the centre had completed four years of its five-year term, he said.
Zardari said PPP workers who had made sacrifices for the party will not be ignored and that he would remain in contact with them and continued visiting Lahore.
Earlier, the president had reportedly said that the Sharifs could not muster enough followers to attend the funeral of their father in Lahore.