PPP counsel objects to IHC judge hearing Naheed’s petition

Friday, 22 May 2015, Source

ISLAMABAD: For the first time in the two years that the case has been pending, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) finally appeared before the Islamabad High Court (IHC) in the dispute regarding the right to use the PPP name.

However, rather than defending themselves against the accusations leveled against the party by former Benazir Bhutto aide Naheed Khan and her husband, former senator Safdar Abbasi, the party’s counsel instead objected to the presence of one of the judges hearing the case.

Separately, however, Mr Abbasi and his wife demanded on Thursday that Asif Ali Zardari step down as co-chairman for making a mess of the party founded by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

It was in May 2013 when Ms Khan, struggling to get control of the PPP name on the basis that Mr Zardari had made the party unpopular in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, had filed a petition before the IHC.

However, in the two years since, the PPP leadership seemed completely uninterested in pursuing the matter.

Ms Khan and Mr Abbasi have recently registered their own faction of the PPP, dubbed the Pakistan People’s Party-Workers (PPP-W) and have contacted several disgruntled PPP leaders to form a greater alliance.

On Thursday, the petitioner was taken by surprise as a high-powered PPP contingent, including party Secretary General Sardar Latif Khan Khosa, Raja Javed Ashraf – brother of former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf – and other local leaders and lawyers from the People’s Lawyers Forum (PLF), appeared in court to defend their party’s stance.