Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Former president Asif Ali Zardari on Monday warned people of a systematic assault on women’s rights in the country and asked them to fight the anti-women’s rights mindset.

In a message on the eve of 63rd birthday of Benazir Bhutto, the slain chairperson of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and two-time elected prime minister of Pakistan, Zardari said, “On this birthday of the Muslim World’s first directly elected woman prime minister, it is worrying that, in the name of religion, obscurantist elements are increasingly suppressing women, some even calling for violence against them.”

“We condemn and reject such declarations by semi literate and obscurantist male chauvinists in the name of religion. We condemn and reject the hysterical anti-women noises increasingly being made by these elements. The party vows to fight bigots and obscurantist to the finish,” he said.

Zardari, co-chairman of the PPP, asked people to follow Bhutto and stand up against militants and extremists and not allow them to impose their ideology through brute force. “At the same time, we must protect and defend democratic institutions and constitutionalism,” he said.

Recalling Bhutto’s last words at the public meeting at Liaquat Bagh in Rawalpindi where she asked people to stand up against extremism, dictatorship, poverty and ignorance, Zardari said these words served as a roadmap for a Pakistan a modern and pluralistic state. Zardari said the PPP would continue to fight militancy and strengthen democracy by fighting forces of status quo and anti-democracy.