After months of speculation, a glimpse of \u2018Awaam Pakistan\u2019 \u2014 the new party on the block \u2014 appeared on the country\u2019s political horizon on Thursday. The video posted on the X account of Awaam Pakistan was shared with the tagline \u2018Awaam Pakistan: Badlein ge nizam\u2019 (People of Pakistan: We will change the system). It featured a string of despondent citizens asking questions about multiple national issues such as inflation, gas and electricity shortage, corruption, unemployment and lack of schools for girls. The video was reposted by ex-finance minister Miftah Ismail and former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, who have long floated the idea of a new political entity to take the country out of perennial crises. Several ex-PML-N leaders listed as founding members of long-expected venture; Khokhar \u2018to stay away\u2019 from new party Mr Abbasi and Mr Ismail \u2014 two former PML-N leaders \u2014 along with former PPP senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar, were said to have been working on the project ever since they quit their parties over policy differences in 2022 and 2023. The three then formed a group of political mavericks that held a series of nationwide seminars in 2023 on the challenges facing the country under the banner of \u2018Reimagining Pakistan\u2019. New party, old guard Mr Abbasi has been mentioned as the convener of Awaam Pakistan\u2019s organising committee, and Mr Ismail his deputy. Sources\u00a0said that Mr Khokhar is no longer with the group as he wanted to push forward the party\u2019s launch to wait for an Islamabad High Court\u2019s decision on the result of NA-47 Islamabad, from where he contested the February 8 general election. However, other members were in favour of a swift launch. Several former PML-N stalwarts have already joined the new party, and known professionals are also filling up the ranks. According to Mr Ismail, the party\u2019s org\u00ada\u00adnising committee included former Khy\u00adber Pakhtunkhwa governor and PML-N leader Sardar Mehtab Ahmed Khan, former PML-N Senator Javed Abbassi and former MQM MNA Sheikh Salahuddin. The founding members include for\u00admer PML-N MNA from Faisalabad Rana Zahid Tauseef, former health minister Zafar Mirza, former PML-N MPA Zaeem Huss\u00adain Qadri, Hazara activist Fatima Atif, Sindhi nat\u00adionalist leader Anwar Soo\u00admro, legal expert Abdul Moiz Jaferii and ex-HEC chairman Tariq Javed Banuri. The former finance minister\u2019s response was in the affirmative when asked if the new party would contest elections. Mr Abbasi, the former prime minister, also confirmed to Dawn that the party will be formally launched on July 6 or 7 with 17 founding members. \u201cWe have not actually pursued anybody. These are people who want to work and think it\u2019s a good platform. They are people who are worried about the country.\u201d \u201cWe are not collecting electables. Professionals and experts should be in political parties; that is the depth we need today,\u201d he said. Mr Abbasi said former prime minister Imran Khan brought professionals into his party after taking power. \u201cThey were not part of his party from the start. In our case, these people are part of a party being launched.\u201d When asked whether the party had engaged with the establishment before its launch, Mr Abbasi said: \u201cOur relationship with the establishment will be according to the Constitution and nothing beyond that \u2014 this is something we firmly believe.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
After months of speculation, a glimpse of \u2018Awaam Pakistan\u2019 \u2014 the new party on the block \u2014 appeared on the country\u2019s political horizon on Thursday….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18187,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news-updates"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}