Religious parties may run for next polls on single platform: JUI-F leader

Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri says efforts under way to form alliance of religious parties for next general elections

Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) leader Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri said on Sunday that religious parties might form an alliance and contest the 2018 general elections on a single platform.

"All religious parties want to form an alliance to participate in the next general polls and efforts are under way to make this possible," Haideri, who is also the Senate deputy chairman, told the participants of a conference in Hyderabad.

The JUI-F leader said religious parties would ensure that they were not "robbed" of their mandate.



He further maintained that if there were an "Islamic " government in Pakistan, it would have prevented the persecution of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

Haideri said India and some other countries wanted to destabilise Pakistan but they would not be allowed to succeed in their nefarious designs.

"There is a clash under way between state institutions and the decisions of the parliament and put on the back burner," he remarked.

"The country is hit by poverty, unrest and instability and it is being run on foreign loans and by selling national assets."