Kashmir was never a problem: Pagaro

KARACHI: The chief of the Pakistan Muslim League (Functional), Pir Pagaro, has said that he did not foresee a solution to the Kashmir issue because it had never been a problem.

He said this while speaking to journalists at Kingri House on Monday.

Pakistan-India talks were being held, he said, but both countries were taking different stances. He also reiterated that elections would be held in 2005 and that the future of parliament and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz was not safe. He said that parliament should be made up of representatives who the people elected, but the present one was the outcome of “Fazal-e-Rabbi” and “apni mahnat.” He said a change of prime ministers had become a tradition and “let us see who breaks this tradition.”

He said he had no advice to offer Mr Aziz, who used to be a banker and had now entered the “jungle of politics” where he would remain if he continued traveling on the same path.

While commenting on the larger federal cabinet, Pir Pagaro said that Pirzada Abdul Sattar’s cabinet had been even larger and it had been discontinued within a short span of time.

He said that he had never talked about the issue of President Musharraf’s military uniform. “It is up to those who approve legislation to draft or abrogate the relevant law,” he said. The pir dismissed the PML Punjab’s resolution calling upon President Musharraf to retain both presidency and the army chief post for the next five years. He said it was just a resolution.

He strongly rebuffed reports that had appeared in Punjab-based newspapers saying that the Functional League had been given a federal ministry because of its “pro-federation sycophancy.” Talking on the issue of Muslim League politics, the pir said that he had no differences with Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain. who is the ruling PML’s president, but he admitted there had been a disagreement between them over certain policies.

He clarified that his son, Pir Sadaruddin Rashidi, provincial minister for works and services, was provincial president of the PML (Functional) and not a member of the ruling PML. He said that his son went to that party as a “coalition partner.”

He said he did not expel Bostan Ali Hoti, the newly appointed divisional president of the ruling PML in Karachi, rather it had been Mr Hoti himself who had joined the PML of his own accord. He said he had named Mr Hoti for the PML Karachi president at a time when he had been with the united PML. Pir Pagaro said that he had parted ways with the PML, but Mr Hoti had remained a part of it.

On the Balochistan issue, he referred to the “Twin Era of Pakistan” a book published in the United States, and said that the Balochistan incidents should be seen in the perspective of the predictions mentioned in that book.

He said that the NWFP government had quit when there had been action in Balochistan in the 1970s and now efforts were being made to compel the NWFP government resign. Answering a question about ANP president Asfandyar Wali’s statement, Pir Pagaro stressed there that Mr Wali’s statement equating the present circumstances with the events of 1971 needed to be understood. He said that Pakistan could get rid of the IMF and the World Bank if it severed ties with the organisations.

He reiterated he would not rejoin the present united PML and that his PML (F) would merge with a reorganized PML when and if this happened. staff report

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