Azadi March: We will fight for our rights, says Imran Khan

Says the enthusiasm of the PTI workers will not fade

ISLAMABAD:

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Wednesday announced to fight tooth and nail to continue its ongoing protest campaign against alleged rigging in 2013 general elections, saying that peaceful protest was their constitutional right.

“Our protest will be peaceful and I assure you [Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif] that if you create hurdles, we will face them and are ready to go to jails,” said the PTI chairman Imran Khan while addressing the sit-in.



Imran said the enthusiasm of the PTI workers would not fade even after going to jails. “If you manage to stop us from holding rally [on November 30] we will do that next Sunday … but you cannot stop us.”

The statement came minutes after Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan clarified government’s position regarding the PTI’s rally in Islamabad and said: “There is no obstacle if anyone wants to hold a political rally on November 30 but a protocol needs to be followed and permission needs to be sought from the district administration.”

In response, Imran Khan said: “No one tells us about our democratic rights. Holding peaceful protest is a right ensured by the Constitution and no one can deny us.”  “We do not need any certificate from the interior minister for holding a peaceful rally,” he added.

The PTI chairman justified his party’s ongoing protest campaign saying they were standing because they had been denied justice. “And we will not leave this place until we get justice,” he added.

He said: “So far we have done nothing and are lying in a corner but both Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar are holding us responsible for lackluster foreign investment.”

Talking about the November 30 rally, being dubbed as decisive by the PTI, Imran Khan said they would assemble at Constitution Avenue on November 29, following which Azadi celebrations would start.

“On November 30 an important announcement will be made and the nature of our demonstrations will also change,” he said.

The PTI chairman demanded that prime minister give details of the recent agreements of investment with China. “Tell us who is going to be the beneficiary of these agreements and who will get money,”

Talking about alleged rigging, Imran Khan shared some details of election tribunals and said it had happened for the first time that both winners and losers were raising voices over transparency of elections.

“There will be more rigging in future elections if we do not take a stand now,” he added.

Earlier in the day, the PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi criticised the statement made by Adviser to Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz, who had said Pakistan is not going to chase militants, who do not pose threat to the state.

Addressing a press conference, Qureshi said adviser’s ‘good Taliban and bad Taliban’ narrative had paved the way for anti-Pakistan lobby within the US Congress to exploit the issue.

“There is a very strong lobby within US Congress that is bent upon blackmailing Pakistan on petty issues [and] you [Sartaj] have provided an open file to them by giving such a controversial statement at a time when chief of army staff [Gen Raheel Sharif] is touring the US,” Qureshi lamented.

During the briefing, journalists lodged protest against Imran Khan’s statement and demanded that the PTI disclose the names of those, who, according to Imran Khan, receive bribes from government.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 20^th, 2014.