ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s opposition alliance has failed to reach a consensus on fielding a joint candidate for the upcoming presidential election despite several rounds of talks, said Sen. Mushahidullah Khan, information secretary of the Pakistan Muslim League — Nawaz (PML-N).
The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has nominated a candidate who is unacceptable to the PML-N leadership, he added.
“We feel that the PPP has intentionally nominated Aitzaz Ahsan to destroy the opposition alliance,” Khan told Arab News, adding that Ahsan has been involved in mudslinging against the PML-N leadership. “The split in the opposition alliance will definitely benefit the ruling party.”
PPP leader Naveed Chaudhry told Arab News that Ahsan “is considered to be the most suitable candidate.”
The five-year term of incumbent President Mamnoon Hussain is set to expire on Sept. 9. The election for the next president will be held on Sept. 4 through a secret ballot.
Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry expressed confidence that the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party and its allies will win the election with its nominee Dr. Arif Alvi, “because we have the required numbers in Parliament and all four provincial assemblies.”
He told Arab News: “We’ve been reaching out to independents in Parliament and provincial assemblies. Our nominee will win with quite a majority even if the opposition alliance fields a joint candidate.”
Prof. Tahir Malik, an academic and political analyst, told Arab News that the opposition alliance is unlikely to field a consensus candidate because the parties in it “have different ideologies and political interests.”
It would be difficult for the PPP to join hands with its decades-old rival party, the PML-N, he said.
Political analyst Rasul Bakhsh Rais said the two parties have had a conflicting relationship for the last 30 years as they had registered criminal cases against each other’s leadership, so it is not easy for them to become allies.
“The opposition alliance will remain in name only, and will be ineffective due to conflicts of interest,” he told Arab News.
Opposition alliance fails to name joint candidate for presidential election
Opposition alliance fails to name joint candidate for presidential election
- PML-N Senator said three rounds of talks among representatives of opposition parties are held so far to develop a consensus but in vain
- Presidential election will be held on September 4 as five-year term of incumbent president expires on September 9
Trump insists he struck Iran on his own terms
- “We are now a nation divided between those who want to fight wars for Israel and those who just want peace and to be able to afford their bills and health insurance,” Marjorie Taylor Greene posted on X.
- Rubio himself doubled down on Tuesday after meeting with US House and Senate members, while insisting that “No, I told you this had to happen anyway”
WASHINGTON, United States: President Donald Trump and his team scrambled Tuesday to reclaim the narrative on why he decided to attack Iran, after his top diplomat suggested the US struck only after learning of an imminent Israeli strike.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio alarmed Democrats — who say only Congress can declare war — as well as many of Trump’s MAGA supporters on Monday when he said: “We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action.”
“We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t pre-emptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio told reporters.
Administration officials quickly backpedalled, insisting Trump authorized the strikes because Tehran was not seriously negotiating an accord on limiting its nuclear ambitions, and the United States needed to destroy Iran’s missile capabilities.
“No, Marco Rubio Didn’t Claim That Israel Dragged Trump into War with Iran,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt posted Tuesday on X.
At an Oval Office meeting later with Germany’s chancellor, Trump went further, saying that “Based on the way the negotiation was going, I think they (Iran) were going to attack first. And I didn’t want that to happen.”
“So, if anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand.”
- Had to happen? -
Rubio himself doubled down on Tuesday after meeting with US House and Senate members, while insisting that “No, I told you this had to happen anyway.”
“The president made a decision. The decision he made was that Iran was not going to be allowed to hide... behind this ability to conduct an attack.”
Critics seized on the muddied messaging to accuse Trump of precipitating the country into a war without a clear rationale, without informing Congress — and without a clear idea of how it might end.
They noted that just two weeks ago, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pressed Trump again in Washington to take a hard line, in their seventh meeting since Trump’s return to power last year.
Some Republican allies rallied behind the president, with Senator Tom Cotton, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, insisting that “No one pushes or drags Donald Trump anywhere.”
“He acts in the vital national security interest of the United States,” Cotton told the “Fox & Friends” morning show.
But as crucial US midterm elections approach that could see Republicans lose their congressional majority, Trump risks shedding supporters who had welcomed his pledge to end foreign military interventions.
“We are now a nation divided between those who want to fight wars for Israel and those who just want peace and to be able to afford their bills and health insurance,” Marjorie Taylor Greene, a top former Trump ally and a major figure in the populist and isolationist hard right, posted on X.
