Politics of power: JUI-F to protest PTI ’s ‘inefficacy with law and order, inflation’

Opposition party says other parties welcome to join protest outside K-P Assembly on Jan 26.

The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) will hold a protest on January 26 against the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led government for allowing lawlessness and inflation to spiral. The decision was announced on Monday after a meeting of the party’s provincial general council a day earlier.

Divulging details of the meeting, JUI-F’s senior provincial leader, MNA Maulana Attaur Rehman said his party will hold a sit-in in front of the K-P Assembly against the PTI-led government.



He argued PTI was only trying to divert the public’s attention from serious problems such as lawlessness and rising inflation – which it has failed to control – through its “politics of dharnas.” The JUI-F will invite other opposition parties to take part in the protest to make it a success, added Rehman.

Discussing upcoming local bodies’ elections, he shared JUI-F’s local chapters have been given a green light to form electoral alliances with other political parties at the district level. To a question about Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Local Government Act 2013, Rehman responded they have reservations over some clauses, adding “We have already challenged some of its clauses in the Peshawar High Court”.

Rehman also demanded an immediate end to the ongoing military operation in North Waziristan, adding the operation has only brought misery to innocent civilians.



JUI-F is the second party to announce a protest against the PTI-led government. Pakistan Peoples Party recently staged a sit-in against price hikes and deteriorating law and order in the province.

With this announcement by one of the largest opposition parties in the provincial assembly, the PTI government has to answer to a hostile opposition. After general elections in May, JUI-F had refused to accept PTI’s electoral victory in K-P and was intent on forming a coalition government in the province with other parties.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 24^th, 2013.