Kaira to replace Fauzia as PPP spokesperson , due to violated discipline.
ISLAMABAD:
Both former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi and PPP information secretary Fauzia Wahab were not invited to a meeting of the party’s frontline leaders on Thursday.
Sources said after the meeting of the People’s Party core committee that it had been decided that Ms Wahab would be replaced by former information minister Qamar Zaman Kaira and Mr Qureshi was unlikely to be considered for a cabinet post. The recent outbursts by the two over the issue of Raymond Davis, a US national accused of killing two men in Lahore, proved their undoing.
President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani apprised the committee about their meetings with US Senator John Kerry where he was told that the case would be decided on the basis of justice and the principle of sovereign equality.
“The meeting also reiterated the position of the party and the government that the strategic partnership and mutually beneficial relations between the two countries should not be allowed to be sacrificed by making them hostage to a single incident,” the president’s spokesman Farhatullah Babar said.
The president informed the committee that he had impressed upon the chairman of the US Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee that the Davis issue had several dimensions that needed to be taken into consideration by both sides.
He said he had told Senator Kerry that there was an urgent need to proceed with caution, showing respect to the sensibilities of all concerned.
He said the matter was before a court which had already ruled that it would decide the issue of immunity for Davis.
The prime minister said he had also suggested that the US needed to take into account the ground realities and acknowledge that the principal stakeholders in the case were the families of those killed and the people of Pakistan.
“The meeting discussed in depth the political situation with particular reference to coalition politics, recent political developments and the emerging scenario,” Mr Babar said.
Interior Minister Rehman Malik gave a briefing on the law and order situation and Law Minister Babar Awan briefed the committee on current legal issues.
Although President Zardari said that the former ministers “who are not in the new cabinet are still PPP’s assets and the party requires their guidance”, sources said a recent press conference by Mr Qureshi had closed the doors on him for any cabinet slot.
According to the sources, the government had planned to provide details about the status of Davis during the hearing of the case in the court on Thursday, but the former minister’s assertion that the accused did not have diplomatic immunity had foiled the move. The government sought three-week time to present its view in the court.
They said the prime minister’s statement that any decision by the court “or the heirs of the deceased” would be acceptable to the government indicated that efforts were being made to placate the victims’ families.
The source said Ms Wahab had not been invited to the meeting because she had violated discipline and issued a statement on the Davis issue on Tuesday against the party line.
“She was not invited because the matter was to be discussed at the meeting,” they said.
