LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Senior Vice President Fawad Chaudhry Saturday expressed willingness to hold talks with the coalition government after it shows seriousness about holding early general elections and announces its date.

“However, the incumbent government, despite their call for talks with the PTI, was not ready to talk,” he said while addressing a press conference here.

H averred that in past they have cooperated with the army, “they said we should hold talks and subsequently we held back door talks with the government”. “When Nawaz Sharif was not willing to hold elections then what was the point of holding the talks? We received a message that the PML-N supremo was not ready to hold early elections due to fear of losing it. If they fear losing the elections then they should adopt Burma or North Korean model, as they cannot believe democracy with this logic,” he added.

He observed that the coalition was a party of ‘non-serious’ people who were oblivious to the revolution that had arrived and compared them to French Queen Marie Antoinette telling her people to eat cake if they did not have bread.

He noted that the government was in a continuous state of denial and not accepting that ‘tabdeeli’ (change) has already arrived in Pakistan. “Unfortunately, it will not be a good ending for the people who were refusing to accept changing ground realities,” he added.

The former federal minister said that the PTI was leading Pakistan towards peaceful change. “It is only because of PTI Chairman Imran Khan that Pakistan has not become like Sri Lanka. It was only because of the PTI that the people were able to protest peacefully,” he added.

“This is a movement of the middle class who want to change the system that only allows elites to make decisions behind closed doors. Hence, people from all walks of life came out in large numbers to get their right to make decisions.

He took on the government by saying that it was holding a press conference every 10 minutes to highlight low turnout in the long march; “if the people have not turned up in the march then the government should be happy”. “Why is the government panicking and forcing the media not to give live coverage to the long march? Let the media show that the long march has failed,” he added.

“We will resume the march from Shahdara and continue our journey to Islamabad; however, we will take a break at Kamoke for an overnight stay,” he added.

To a question, he responded that there was a threat to the life of the PTI Chairman during the long march and hence the party had decided to hold the march during the daytime.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022