PML-N planning a motion to impeach President

A lawmaker from Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Sunday said his party was planning to table a motion in the parliament to impeach President Pervez Musharraf. Member National Assembly Hanif Abbasi said in his speech during a debate on the budget that the PML-N would soon be taking a step in this regard.

Later, he told private television channels that Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s Jamiat Ulamae Islam (JUI) had also promised the intended move. But a senior leader of PML-N, Raja Zafarul Haq, expressed ignorance that the party had any such intention.

Two major parties in the ruling coalition-Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and PML-N-have different opinion on how they should deal with the falling President.

The PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif is in favour of his immediate impeachment but the PPP seems to have a policy of frustrating Musharraf for walking out voluntarily. Abbasi also criticised a reported statement by Defence Minister Chaudhry Ahmad Mukhtar in which he expressed helplessness to control aerial attacks inside Pakistani territory by the United States-led coalition forces stationed in Afghanistan.

“If we can’t stop them, then what for we have the atom bomb and military,” Abbasi argued, as he demanded of the government to come up with a stern warning to the US.