LAHORE: Former president Asif Zardari on Thursday said governments come and go but the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) was here to stay for the times to come.
Addressing an event to mark Pakistan Day, Zardari said that he was the first one who had said ‘Pakistan Khappay’. He said that love for Pakistan was the first priority and that it was up to the leaders of today to protect the generation of tomorrow.
“When I apologised to the people of Balochistan, I was severely criticised,” he said.
The former president also spoke highly of his wife Benazir Bhutto and said that she had fought for democracy against the dictatorship of Ziaul Haq.
Zardari said that the ‘NRO election’ conducted by former chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry held no value and that the PPP was here to stay.
“Governments come and go but PPP is here to stay,” he said.
Flaying the government, Zardari said that he observed arrogance in the leaders of today. He rejected the idea that the country was progressing merely just because of the construction of roads and motorways.
Separately, at a ceremony to mark the 88th birth anniversary of Begum Nusrat Bhutto, Zardari paid glowing tributes to her “for a life well spent in the cause of democracy and welfare of the people”. “As a towering woman of great courage and conviction and enduring indescribable personal tragedies in the pursuit of democratic struggle she illumined the path,” said the former president. The ceremony was attended among others by former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Punjab PPP President Qamar Zaman Kaira, Chaudhry Manzoor, Lateef Khosa, Bashir Riaz, Sadiq Umrani, Rukhsana Bangash, Samina Ghurki and Munawar Anjum.
“Begum Sahiba stood tall and erect in all adversities and in doing so has imparted lessons in tolerance and endurance that will lift the democracy loving people to higher goals in life and is worth emulating,” he said.
“It is an irony of fate that when democratic struggle triumphed over the dark forces of dictatorship she was not around to savor the glory of this triumph,” he concluded.
