Lahore:
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari was re-elected on Saturday as President of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) for a four-year term, while Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain was re-elected president of the Pakistani Muslim League (PML-Q).
The PPP held intra-party surveys at the central secretariat in the Federal capital.
Humayun Khan was elected secretary general of the party for four years while Nadeem Afzal Gondal (Chan) as information secretary for the same period.
Likewise, Amna Piracha was elected secretary of finance for four years. PPP officials were elected in accordance with the party’s constitution.
From who won and when the elections took place, the way the news was reported in the media – almost all party leaders in Punjab that Express PK Press Club spoke did not seem largely unconscious of the intra -party.
According to the official notification, the elections took place in Islamabad. However, several senior party leaders – at least Punjab – remained completely unconscious of development. Those who were aware said they had learned it on social networks. None of the leaders could say who the candidates were or if the winners had faced an opposition or had been elected without opposition. Almost all expressed their disappointment not to be informed of the date of the elections.
Nadeem Afzal Chan, who was himself among the winners, told L’Express PK Press Club that he had submitted his candidacy documents. However, when he was asked how he had discovered the results of the elections, he admitted that he was not fully aware. When asked if the elections had been disputed or if all the candidates had been elected without opposition, he said that he did not have this information. “I’m going to have to visit the party’s office to find out what really happened,” he said. He added that electoral roles had been prepared, in particular district lists and awarded voter numbers.
A leader of the Punjab senior party, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that he was not aware of the intra-party elections and their result, learning them only during the telephone call. He recalled that some time ago reported the training of an electoral commission of three members and that the party president had caused elections within five weeks. However, no calendar or timetable has been communicated to them, he said. Although the president re-elected several times was not unusual, he added, “the absence of appropriate elections for other key positions marked a new hollow for the PPP”.
He said that the newly elected information secretary Nadeem Afzal Chan had done everything possible to become president of the central Punjab, but the president of the PPPP Asif Ali Zardari opposed this recommendation of the president of the Bilawal Bhutto Zardari party. The leader explained that Zardari’s decision was based on Chan’s “opportunistic behavior”, in particular his move to the PTI when the PPP was in a difficult position. Despite this, the party president chose to appoint Chan as an information secretary.
He also noted that the president seemed to honor those who had changed allegiances, as evidenced by his speech at the house of the governor of Lahore, where individuals like Manzoor Chaudary, Aitezaz Ahsan and Nadeem Afzal Chan were invited to sit on stage with the president, while the faithful members of the party and the senior leaders were relegated among the workers.
