AMN / Islamabad
Two days after Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi distanced himself from the anti-Ahmadi remarks by his party’s leader Capt (retd) Mohammad Safdar on the floor of the National Assembly, PML-N president Nawaz Sharif has also distanced his party from the remarks of his son-in-law.
“I declare it in categorical and unequivocal terms that all minorities living in Pakistan enjoy complete fundamental rights, including protection to their lives and property, under the Constitution and Islamic teachings,” Mr Sharif said in a statement issued from London and released to the local media by PML-N spokesman Senator Asif Kirmani here on Sunday.
“Any negative expression in this regard has nothing to do with the ideology and policy of the PML-N,” Mr Sharif clarified, without elaborating or mentioning the speech of the party MNA, who also happens to be his son-in-law.
During a television interview last week, Prime Minister Abbasi had stated that neither he nor Nawaz Sharif or the PML-N was responsible for the views expressed against the Ahmadi community by Capt Safdar.
“We should stay away from such statements which create unrest in the society,” Mr Abbasi had said while agreeing that being the son-in-law of Mr Sharif he should have behaved more responsibly.
Muhammad Safdar, a retired army captain married to Sharif’s daughter Maryam Nawaz, accused Ahmadis of working against the country’s interests while speaking in the National Assembly on Tuesday.
He criticised the renaming of Quaid-e-Azam University’s physics centre after Abdus Salam, Pakistan’s first Nobel laureate because of the scientist’s Ahmadi faith. The renaming was approved by Sharif in December 2016.
“These people (Ahmadis) are a threat to this country, its Constitution and ideology. This situation is heading towards a dangerous point,” Safdar said in his speech that was widely criticised by rights activists and civil society groups.
The PML-N lawmaker described Salam as “a controversial figure that has been termed an infidel in light of the Constitution”. He also said there was no concept of jihad in the “false religion” of the Ahmadis.
Safdar said he wanted to present a resolution in the National Assembly calling for a “ban on the recruitment of Qadianis (Ahmadis) in the armed forces”.