Islamabad
Anger of senior PML-N lawmakers has started boiling over the government’s attitude and failure to tackle the month long sit-in outside the Parliament House, The Nation learnt on Monday.
Several PML-N Senators and MNAs have been gnashing their teeth since Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehrik (PAT) brought supporters to Islamabad to top Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
As Imran Khan and Dr Tahirul Qadri have been mocking the government and PML-N ministers, lawmakers of the ruling government have lost patience with the government for not taking action against the participants of the sit-ins.
PML-N Senator Muhammad Zafarullah Khan Dhandla is so annoyed with his government that he never showed up at any session of the joint sitting of Parliament summoned by the government recently to drum up support against PTI and PAT.
And some lawmakers of the ruling party even complain that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who is also President PML-N, has not bothered to convene meeting of party’s Central Working Party to discuss the prevailing political agitation.
“The government has come out weaker. Apart from administrative issues, the government also represents PML-N as a party. It is unfortunate that no meeting of PML-N’s central working party has convened so far,” PML-N Senator Zafar Ali Shah told The Nation on Monday.
Mr Shah predicted that the government will hopefully survive the political agitation but the ‘aftershocks’ of the sit-ins will seriously haunt the government after five or six months.
Sources in the party told this reporter that several PML-N hawks were annoyed more with the government than with Imran Khan or Dr Qadri arguing that the government had reduced the largest political party in the country to a political pygmy.
“PML-N is the ruling party because it had obtained maximum votes in the country. But the way the government is hiding behind few opposition politicians has reduced the strength of PML-N. The government exists no where and this is what PTI wanted,” a PML-N MNA  told The Nation seeking not to be named due to party’s policy.
But MNA Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhary who represents Islamabad is pessimistic that the sit-in participants at D-Chowk would disperse without taking any administrative action adding that the talks with PTI and PAT would not end positively.
“The only reason we can’t use force is because there are women and children among the protesters. What I personally want is that the government should simply discourage entry of protesters to D-chowk,” the lawmaker said.
The Nation learnt that PML-N’s key members have raised eye brows over the dependence of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and other opposition forces at the cost of abandoning the leaders of his own party.
A federal minister asserted that the government had focused only on obtaining support from inside the Parliament and had given a free hand to PTI for staging anti-government demonstrations across the country.
“Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has perhaps forgotten that the street agitation against his government will soon enter the National Assembly where he currently feels comfortable. He must reach out to the cities for clinching support of public as well,” he added.
“Just imagine that PML-N’s workers have displayed no banner or poster in Rawalpindi-Islamabad in support of their leadership.
On the other side you see banners of Dr Qadri and Imran Khan. This is because the PML-N has seized to act as party,” a Rawalpindi-based PML-N member commented.
Referring to Prime Minister’s recent visit to flood victims where the premier was greeted with anti-government slogans by participants, the PML-N leader said the government should immediately reach out to office-bearers of the party by holding workers convention.
He said that Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif was recently apprised by some senior politicians of the ruling party that the pro-government support in Parliament House was not enough to quell the prevailing political agitation or rescue Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
“Why can’t the PML-N hold public gatherings at Liaquat Bagh? After all Rawalpindi is the stronghold of PML-N. If Sheikh Rashid can lead protesters from Lal Haveli to Islamabad why can’t PML-N stage a mammoth rally in Rawalpindi,” a senior party leader said.