Socio-economic development: PPP not to be distracted from agenda, says President

President Asif Ali Zardari on Thursday said that Pakistan People's Party (PPP) would continue to pursue its agenda of socio-economic development and will not be distracted from it under any circumstances. Addressing a meeting of the elected Nazims, Councillors and office bearers of the party from Rawalpindi district in the Presidency he said the government was determined to pursue a larger agenda and not bogged down in petty political squabbling.
Those who attended the meeting included among others Fauzia Habib, Farahnaz Ispahani, Senator Faisal Raza Abidi and spokesperson to the President Farhatullah Babar. The President said that Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had given nuclear technology and Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto gave the country missile technology and made the defences stronger and at the same time embarked upon a massive socio-economic development programme.
He said that the present government had decided to make Pakistan a welfare driven state where the welfare of the poor and downtrodden masses was given precedence over every other thing.
In this context, the President said, the government launched Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) to extricate the poor from below the poverty line, reinstated the sacked workers, gave 12 percent shares in state-run enterprises to the workers and devised plans to give state lands free of cost to poor women in the command areas of the twelve new dams that will be built in the country in the next three years. He said the party had adopted policy of reconciliation as a conscious political decision for the sake of harmony and political stability so that the developmental agenda could be vigorously pursued.
The President said that he would hold meetings more frequently with workers and for this purpose a system was being devised to address corner meetings of the party workers via satellite which will be launched soon from Rawalpindi. President Zardari also assured the party workers that the development package for Rawalpindi announced by Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto on December 27, moments before her assassination would be implemented.