By NNN-PTI
Islamabad : Former Pakistan Premier Benazir Bhutto has sought her political rival Nawaz Sharif’s cooperation in devising a joint strategy to prevent any attempts to rig the January 8 general election.
Bhutto, the Chairperson of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), discussed the matter with PML-N chief Sharif during a telephonic conversation on Tuesday night. The two leaders also discussed the political situation, especially the upcoming polls, the ‘Daily Times’ reported Thursday.
“She shared some reports concerning pre-poll rigging by the PML-Q (the party which backs President Pervez Musharraf) with Nawaz,” the newspaper quoted a PML-N source as saying.
Bhutto urged Sharif to devise a joint strategy to thwart any “poll-rigging plans”, sources said. Sharif told close aides that since both the PPP and PML-N had decided to contest the polls, they had no option but to mobilise the masses to “foil the PML-Q’s plans”.
The two leaders also decided to meet again before the elections, the sources said. They had met for the first time after both returned to Pakistan from exile to discuss a possible boycott of the polls but were unable to reach an understanding.
Sharif’s political secretary Pervez Rasheed confirmed that the two leaders had had a telephone conversation, but refused to give details.
He said “political issues always come under discussion when politicians talk to each other. It was a brief conversation and nothing significant was discussed in it.”