JI keeps Islamabad march option open

Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) will not abandon its right to march on Islamabad until the petroleum levy is abolished, and will expand its protest campaign if the government fails to provide relief to the masses, JI Emir Hafiz Naeemur Rehman said on Wednesday.

Addressing a press conference in the federal capital, Rehman said the long march had been postponed for a few days at Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's request. He said he would meet the prime minister after returning to Pakistan and that the party's next course of action would depend on the outcome of the meeting.

"The better option is to abolish the petroleum levy. Otherwise, people will come out to seek the removal of the government," the JI chief maintained.

The JI has been staging sit-ins and protests against the petroleum levy since August. The party initially launched road blockades at 510 locations before holding sit-ins at 42 locations across the country on August 16. The campaign later developed into a train march towards Islamabad before the long march was postponed following a telephone conversation between Rehman and the prime minister.

Rehman said the JI would continue its protests during the pause and hold public meetings, including in Lahore and other cities. He said the party had held several rounds of negotiations with the government and presented workable proposals, but had not received a convincing response.

He said reducing the interest rate by three percentage points could save the national exchequer more than Rs1.5 trillion and called for cuts in government privileges and expenditure. The JI leader also demanded taxes on large landowners, an end to capacity payments to independent power producers (IPPs) and action against corruption in the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).

The JI emir rejected the government's argument that the petroleum levy was necessary to meet International Monetary Fund (IMF) requirements. He said the IMF agreement did not specifically require Pakistan to meet revenue targets through the levy, arguing that the government should instead reduce expenditure and broaden the tax base.

On September 3, the government and JI agreed to constitute expert committees to examine measures for reducing the petroleum levy and providing relief to consumers.

Rehman said consumers were paying about Rs140 per litre in taxes on petrol and described the burden as unacceptable. He also criticised the government for borrowing heavily from private banks and paying billions of rupees in interest, linking the issue to what he described as an unfair economic system.