Dharna continues: Staying put, Qadri renews demands

Reiterates call for dissolution of Parliament, assemblies.

ISLAMABAD:

Undeterred by arrest attempts, freezing cold and threats of possible police action, Minhaj-ul-Quran International chief Dr Tahirul Qadri set on Wednesday yet another deadline for the government to fulfil his demands which the latter has already rejected as “unconstitutional”.

The fiery cleric asked Chief Election Commissioner Fakhruddin G Ebrahim, whom he described as “honest but too old”, to voluntarily resign.

Addressing his tens of thousands of supporters at D-Chowk in Islamabad, Dr Qadri renewed his call for the dissolution of Parliament and provincial assemblies and the formation of a neutral interim set-up. “The government has until Wednesday night to implement our demands,” he added.

Dr Qadri said the CEC is over 85, and too fragile to ensure free and fair elections alone. The other four provincial chief election commissioners, Qadri claimed, had political affiliations. “The provincial election commissioners are biased and a direct threat to free and fair elections,” the cleric stressed.

In an apparent attempt to quell conspiracy theories, Dr Qadri said his Tuesday’s speech and the Supreme Court’s order for the arrest of Prime Minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf was mere coincidence.



“I was unaware of any such decision before making my speech,” he told the participants of dharna, which entered its third day. He added that he was ready to drop his demands if any of them were unconstitutional.

Once again hitting out at the government, the cleric dubbed it as a corrupt administration which failed to deliver on justice, good governance and protection of human rights. He added that despite the government’s “attempts to deter him” he was not afraid of arrest or the use of force by the state.

Continuing with his charged rhetoric, Dr Qadri said, “They (the police) targeted us, fired gunshots at us, refused to register our complaint and I know they are planning to use force against the unarmed participants of the sit-in”.

He claimed that he had received reports that the authorities have arranged for a fund worth over Rs2billion for the sole purpose of dispersing the protesters within the next two days. “(You) people here have no fear. Instead, our strength has increased from yesterday,” Dr Qadri said.



Case registered

After the MQI chief’s earlier address in the morning, the Kohsar police registered a case against him and his associates. The FIR was registered on the complaint of police officer Inspector Mehboob Ahmed, who is the Bhara Kahu SHO. Ahmed suffered injuries in a brief clash between law enforcers and protesters Tuesday morning.

The case was registered under 11 sections of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC), including attempted murder, theft and attempting to stop a state official from performing his duties. The complainant maintained that MQI members stopped the police from executing the government’s orders to arrest Dr Qadri.



On the other hand, a sessions court asked the police to submit a report on why the Kohsar police did not register an FIR against Interior Minister Rehman Malik, the Islamabad SSP operations and other police officials on the complaint of the MQI management for “attempting to kidnap” Dr Qadri. The court sought a report from the police on January 18.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 17^th, 2013.