By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz-led coalition government and the party of the jailed former prime minister Imran Khan began talks in Islamabad on Friday, three days before a planned long march on the capital that has pushed Islamabad and the opposition-run province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) towards a constitutional confrontation.
Delegations from the federal government and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) met in the chamber of National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq at Parliament House. Both sides fielded six-member teams.
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi led the government side, which includes members of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), the governing coalition’s main partner. Others present included Rana Sanaullah, the prime minister’s adviser on political affairs, and Talal Chaudhry, the state minister for interior. The PPP was represented by Senator Sherry Rehman, Naveed Qamar and Ejaz Jakhrani. Parliamentary affairs minister Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry and Amir Muqam also reached the venue. Naqvi opened the session with a briefing on the law and order situation in KP.
The PTI team was led by party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan. It also included Senate opposition leader Allama Raja Nasir Abbas and the party’s Asad Qaiser, Salman Akram Raja, Aamir Dogar and Haleem Adil Sheikh.
The PTI had to reconstitute its delegation at the last minute. Mahmood Khan Achakzai, who heads the opposition alliance Tehreek-e-Tahafuz-e-Ayin-e-Pakistan (TTAP), refused to attend a meeting in the Speaker’s chamber. He said he would take part only at a neutral venue. Sources told reporters the PTI leadership rejected his demand and named a new team.
The talks are the first formal contact since Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif decided to engage the opposition. The decision was agreed at a meeting with President Asif Ali Zardari that also reviewed the security situation, and it produced a joint delegation of the government and the PPP. Local television reported that the option of an emergency was raised at the presidency, but the coalition decided to give dialogue a chance before considering anything further.
The PTI had set the protest for September 27 before pushing it back to October 4. The party says the march is aimed at securing the release of Mr Khan and restoring what it calls constitutional supremacy. Khan has been in jail since August 2023 and faces several criminal cases. He denies wrongdoing, and the PTI says the cases are politically motivated.
In recent weeks, federal ministers have increasingly discussed constitutional measures against the PTI-led provincial government, including governor’s rule and an emergency. They cite the deteriorating security situation in KP. Officials have pointed to worsening militant violence there. PTI leaders reject any such move and have called for political engagement instead. KP Chief Minister Sohail Afridi has said the October 4 protest will be peaceful and has dismissed warnings of federal intervention.
Gohar said on Thursday that the government’s message on the meeting had reached the party on Wednesday and had been accepted in line with decisions taken by opposition leaders. He said the opposition would enter the talks without preconditions. “We will meet the government with complete sincerity,” he said. He added that the final decision on the march would depend on the government’s attitude. He also complained that the KP government had not received its due share of National Finance Commission funds, despite expanding its police force.
Before the talks, Gohar, Abbas, Qaiser and a former senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar met Jamaat-e-Islami chief Hafiz Naeemur Rehman. They discussed the political situation, the proposed all-parties conference and the march. Abbas said the conference’s aim was to find a way out of the crisis.
Naeem said his party had accepted the invitation and would back consensus on a national agenda covering peace, law and order and the economy. “Pakistan belongs to no one party or institution,” he said, calling for an end to bloodshed. He opposed governor’s rule or an emergency in K-P and any move to suspend the constitution. He also urged action on concerns over Khan’s health. He called for the release of women arrested in connection with the protests, including Khan’s sisters, and for no obstacles to bail for PTI leaders.
Government figures struck a conciliatory tone before the meeting. Tariq said the prime minister had invited the opposition and that the government’s doors remained open. He said dialogue was preferable to confrontation and urged the opposition to avoid an “onslaught” on Islamabad. He also called on the K-P government to play its part in countering terrorism.
Sanaullah urged the PTI to withdraw its call for the march, saying long marches and disorder solved nothing and that matters before the courts must be decided by the courts. He questioned the opposition’s objections to the venue. “You can sit by the roadside under a tree and talk, but you cannot meet at the Prime Minister’s Office,” he said, adding that such statements damaged political tolerance. Earlier this week he described the march as a provincial government attacking the capital, and said the two sides had been holding off-the-record contacts.
He also addressed Khan’s health. He said the PTI founder, held at Adiala jail, had been moved to a hospital and examined by a panel of senior doctors for a medical check-up. He said the hospital was not a private facility. If the courts issued further clear directions, he said, the government would be bound to comply.
The two sides remain far apart on the street. Government sources have said the authorities would stop the march entering Islamabad. Abbas has alleged that containers have been placed to block the capital, roads dug up and nails laid along routes before the protest has begun. PTI sources say the party has planned a sit-in outside Governor House if governor’s rule or an emergency is imposed, and has set up a legal team to challenge any federal action against the provincial government.
Past talks give little cause for optimism. Negotiations between the government and the PTI began in December 2024 under Mr Sadiq’s chairmanship. They broke down after the party boycotted the fourth round in late January 2025, saying its demands, including judicial commissions, had been ignored.
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