PTI banks on its power base for dharna success

Party’s K-P leadership asked to ensure huge turnout

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) is primarily relying on its political bastion in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa to provide manpower for its scheduled Nov 2 Islamabad protest which was preceded by a government crackdown on the PTI and its allied parties, particularly in Rawalpindi and Islamabad.

The arrest of PTI workers started on the evening of October 27 when the party tried to hold a youth convention in Sector E-11, hours after the district magistrate banned all kinds of assemblies and gatherings of five or more people in the capital.



Later, police and Frontier Constabulary personnel also laid siege to PTI chief Imran Khan’s Bani Gala residence, triggering clashes between his party supporters and the law enforcers which continued on Saturday. The situation in the city in general and around Khan’s residence in particular remained tense but there was no immediate report of any loss of life.

On account of the government’s hostile strategy, indicating its willingness to go to any extent to curtail the influx of PTI activists into Islamabad, the PTI leadership is not banking on its popular support from Punjab, at least not for the first day of the protest.

“The party’s senior leadership in Bani Gala has confirmed the revised strategy and the same message has been conveyed to the top party leaders in the K-P,” one of the cabinet members in the K-P government confirmed to The Express Tribune.

According to the revised plan that consists of mobilising masses from the K-P, the whole province has been divided into four administrative zones – Peshawar, South, Hazara and Malakand/Swat. MPA Shah Farman is heading the Peshawar region while South Region, Malakand Region and Hazara Region will be headed by Amin Gandapur, Mehmood Khan and Zar Gul, respectively.

The party has been paying special attention to the Peshawar Zone that consists of five districts, Peshawar, Mardan, Charsadda, Swabi and Nowshera. The PTI enjoys vast popularity in these districts with five elected MNAs and 25 MPAs. All these districts are located at a travelling distance of one to two hours from Islamabad.

“If we talk about Peshawar region alone, there are over 9,500 elected local government (LG) office bearers of the PTI,” said Engineer Hamidul-Haq Khalil, the PTI MNA from Peshawar.



Unlike Punjab, he said, the LG system installed in the K-P would benefit the most in terms of mobilisation of the masses with the presence of elected party office-bearers even at street level.

“The number of elected PTI’s LG representatives in the whole Peshawar region is around 25,000. Presence of elected representatives has been declared a must in November 2 protest,” Khalil said.

He said the PTI hoped that from Peshawar region alone these 25,000 elected PTI representatives would pull a crowd of nearly 200,000 towards Islamabad on November 2.

To facilitate the movement from Peshawar region, the PTI has established a base camp near Swabi interchange on Peshawar-Islamabad motorway. To overcome the issue of road blockades, Khalil said, main rally from Swabi would be led by two cranes and a bulldozer.

Talking about preparation at the level of Malakand/Swat region, MNA Saleem Rehman from Swat said the region comprises seven districts – Malakand, Swat, Upper Dir, Lower Dir, Chitral, Boner. The PTI’s elected LG members in this region, according to Rehman, are approximately 15,000.



“We are hopeful that crowd coming from the K-P and the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad on November 2 will be enough to teach a lesson to the corrupt regime,” senior PTI leader Dr Shireen Mazari told The Express Tribune.

However, she negated the impression that the PTI would chiefly depend on the K-P government, saying activists from all four provinces and Azad Jammu Kashmir (AJK) would join Imran Khan on November 2.

The PTI MNA Shehryar Afridi from Kohat, which is part of South region, said the party leadership had not given any target in terms of bringing people to Islamabad. However, he said, efforts would be made to bring out the as much as people as possible.“I have no doubt what Khan Sahib has claimed that one million people will march to Islamabad on November 2,” Afridi said.

A senior leader said the party MNAs, MPAs, and activists had been advised not to travel to Islamabad before November 2.

“This direction has been passed as a couple of MPAs, Fazal Hakim Khan and Muhibullah Khan, along with their supporters reached Bani Gala well before time, on Thursday night. Also, Imran Khan has already advised that activists should avoid arrests and stay in the K-P until November 2,” he added.

Heavy deployment outside PTI chairman Imran Khan’s residence in Bani Gala continued on Saturday with sporadic clashes between PTI workers and law-enforcers.  At the three check-points on the road leading to Imran’s house, the police kept checking all commuters by but let most the people through.

Just before the sunset, the PTI supporters threw stones on the police which fired tear gas in response. Elsewhere in the city, there were no blockades or disruption. However, heavy contingents of law-enforcers continued to man all the entry points of the city as shipping containers lay on the roadsides.

Separately, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Khan on Saturday removal of all hurdles from the roads which connect Islamabad with K-P, said the spokesman of Ministry of Interior on Saturday.

“Only on motorway a limited hurdle was placed last night as an armed group of 900 persons had attempted to get into Islamabad,” the spokesman further stated.

The roads which link K-P with Islamabad including the Motorway and GT Road had been blocked by the government to stop his workers to get into Islamabad to participate in the protest campaign.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 30^th, 2016.