Street protests: PTI to consult opposition over future action

Shah Mehmood Qureshi says strategy will be drawn up on the basis of consensus

ISLAMABAD: Renewing its threat of street protests against the government for dragging its feet over the Panamagate inquiry, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf on Sunday slightly altered its tactics, noting that it will consult other opposition parties before finalising its future plan of action.

The decision came during a high-level meeting between PTI Chairman Imran Khan and the party’s deputy parliamentary leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi in Islamabad on Sunday as the latter briefed the former on progress made by the parliamentary committee tasked to draft consensual terms of reference (ToRs) for the proposed inquiry commission.

A statement issued by party’s media office after the meeting said that PTI will consult other opposition parties on Tuesday in a bid to prepare for the next parliamentary committee meeting and to evolve its future course of action.  “We will take this issue of an independent and transparent inquiry into Panama Papers to its logical conclusion,” the statement quoted Qureshi as saying.



Vowing to foil government’s plans to sow discord among the opposition, Qureshi said that the party wants to prepare a future course of action which is evolved through consensus.

“We are well aware of the government’s designs to isolate the PTI,” he said, adding that his party would evolve a future course of action after consulting opposition members on Tuesday.

The party has been frustrated by constant government delays over the inquiry. The committee has failed to break a deadlock on the ToRs which has so far only decided on a four-point preamble of the terms but neither side has conceded space to the other.

After the seventh meeting of the parliamentary committee late last week, Qureshi said that the government wants to save the Sharif family.

“I’ve concluded that this committee is of no use,” he said. “I will request the PTI chairman to part ways with the useless body.”

Subsequently, Imran threatened that ’10 per cent of Pakistan’s population’ will hold street protests after Eidul Fitr if the ToRs for the proposed inquiry commission are not drafted at the earliest.  Party insiders said on Sunday that Qureshi had told Imran that chances of a breakthrough on the ToRs are limited.

PTI insiders now believe that the next parliamentary committee meeting scheduled to be held on Tuesday, may be the last that the PTI attends.

Keeping in view the party’s threat to launch street agitation after Eid, PTI’s election commissioner Senator Nauman Wazir also attended Sunday’s meeting. He briefed the party’s leadership about newly registered members of the party and how they can be mobilised.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 13^th, 2016.