ISLAMABAD(APP): President Asif Ali Zardari on Thursday said that the PPP Government has the mandate of the people and it would complete its term despite obstacles, difficulties, challenges and machinations.“The Government has many achievements to its credit during first half of its tenure and declared amidst thunderous applause that it will complete its term,” the President said while speaking at meeting of the Central Executive Committee of the Party at Aiwan-e-Sadr.The meeting that lasted for about four hours was attended by Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani and over forty members of the Party’s highest body.
Spokesperson to the President Farhatullah Babar while briefing the media said that the President asked the Party workers and the office bearers to be proud of achievements of the Government that ranged from NFC Award to Aghaz-i-Haqooq-i-Balochistan Package,from giving the workers shares in the industrial units to the 18th Constitutional Amendment and from pursuing the policy of reconciliation to taking the militants head on.
Farhatullah Babar quoted the President as saying that the Party was committed to defend democracy, protect the Constitution and uphold the supremacy of the Parliament.
The President said that the Government was concentrating on relief and rehabilitation of the flood affected people and revival of the economy damaged by the devastating floods. He said that he had proposed to the Government to levy one time flood tax on urban properties in order to create resources for rebuilding and reconstructing the damaged infrastructure.
The President said that the Government was focussing on garnering maximum international support for the flood affected people and for revival of the economy, the Government, however, also have to generate indigenous resources in order to have credibility with the international donors.
The President said that the Government was deeply conscious of the fact that the success of the relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction operation depended also on the trust of the donors, both the international and the local, that their donations were being properly utilized along with complete confidence of the flood victims that every penny meant for them was being spent on them.
With this in mind plans had been devised to ensure that complete web based information was available to everyone on the one hand and all the stakeholders, including the provinces, were on board in the relief efforts on the other, he said. The President stressed that access to complete information was key to transparency which in turn was the key to good governance and eliminating corruption and mismanagement.
The President also urged the members of the Committee to reach out to the affected people and complement Government’s efforts for their rehabilitation and ensuring transparency of the entire process.
About organization of the Party, the President said beginning with Balochistan, the Party would be reorganized to make it more responsive to the current political challenges and rise to the expectations of the people. – App
