PML-N leader and Member of the National Assembly Javed Latif on Sunday said that “whether [the government] chooses to call him a traitor or hangs him”, he — along with his party — will “not let Pakistan sink.”
Latif was speaking to PML-N workers, who had gathered outside his residence to show solidarity with him.
This Maryam Safdar sycophant Javed Latif has the audacity to threaten to break up Pakistan. Any fool who places loyalty to leader above loyalty to the country is a disgrace & should be dealt with accordingly. pic.twitter.com/d3nXf7OxRf
— Ali Haider Zaidi (@AliHZaidiPTI) March 13, 2021
A day ago, Javed Latif had made a controversial comment which was deemed “anti-Pakistan” by the government. Latif had said that if anything happens to Maryam Nawaz, then “PML-N will not say Pakistan Khappay”, unlike Zardari, who had used those words after Benazir Bhutto was assassinated.
Following the comment, PTI Central Punjab had announced a protest against the remarks made by Latif.
Addressing PML-N workers today, Latif said that even if someone sees the future generations of Pakistan “sinking” or moving towards a decline, they are expected to stay silent for the fear of being labelled a traitor (instead of showing concern and being vocal about it). “Call me a traitor, hang me, but we will not let Pakistan sink as long as we are alive,” Latif said.
Instructing the workers to prepare for the long march under the banner of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) — an 11-party alliance of the Opposition that aims to oust the PTI-led government — Javed Latif said that some “incompetent people have been imposed on the nation”.
“The purpose of the march is to get rid of this incompetent [government]. For the march, caravans should leave every neighborhood and union council of [the city],” said Latif.
The government has come down hard on opposition over “Pakistan Khappay” remarks made by PML-N stalwart Javed Latif following efforts aimed at canceling bail granted to the party’s vice president Maryam Nawaz in the Chaudhry Sugar Mills case.
“Those who want to follow [MQM founder] Altaf Hussain’s path should remember the end of his journey too,” Federal Minister for Science and Technology Fawad Chaudhry warned while addressing a news conference flanked by Information Minister Shibli Faraz in Islamabad on Sunday.
Read More: Nawaz Sharif’s anti-Pakistan interview and its cost: A snake in the grass?
Latif, while speaking to a private TV channel last night, had said that if anything happened to the daughter of three-time Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the party would not say “Pakistan Khappay” – a slogan raised by former president Asif Ali Zardari following the assassination of his wife Benazir Bhutto in 2007.
Referring to Hussain, who is residing in London on political asylum since early 90s, Fawad said both the MQM founder and Sharif were a “gift of 1985 elections” and trained by the same people, adding that both personalities were “non-political”.
“Neither the MQM founder nor Nawaz Sharif can return from London,” the minister said. “We are not here to label others traitors… defeat or victory are part of the electoral process, but that does not mean that one should start talking against the state,” he said. “Whatever Javed Latif was made to say has caused anger among the masses,” he maintained. Sharif, he suggested, should return Pakistan’s ‘looted wealth’ to avoid jail.