Petrol and power: PTI protests against price hike

Leaders vow to continue protests till govt withdraws decisions.

LAHORE:

The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf staged a demonstration at the Lahore Press Club on Wednesday to condemn the hike in the prices of petroleum products and electricity.

The protesters waved party flags and placards, chanted slogans, staged a sit-in and cheered as PTI leaders made speeches demanding the withdrawal of the PML-Nawaz government’s decision to increase prices.

Addressing the protesters, MPA Mian Aslam Iqbal said that the PML-N had promised during its election campaign to restore prices to the level they were at in 1999. The rate of inflation in the last three months had been higher than for the last 15 years, he said. Now the poor were committing suicide because they couldn’t make enough money to feed their families, he added.

Dr Yasmin Rashid, general secretary of the PTI Punjab chapter, said the party would continue to protest until the government withdrew the price hikes. It would also protest against the government’s other “anti-people” policies. To raise the price of petrol when it had gone down in the international market was an injustice, she said.

PTI Punjab President Ejaz Chaudhry said the party would force the government to end its “cruel policies”. The rulers want to suck the blood from the common man, he added. The PTI was committed to the welfare of the general public and would help them raise their voice, he added.

MNA Shafaqat Mehmood also attended the protest.

South Punjab

In Bahawalpur, PTI south Punjab president Noor Muhammad Bhabha said that the PML-N government had performed poorly in office. “On the completion of his government’s 100 days in office, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has hit the country with an economic bomb,” he told a press conference.

He said the PTI would stage country-wide protests in front of the press clubs in major cities. He said if the government continued to raise petroleum and electricity prices at the current rate, it would break all records over the next five years.

He said the first 100 days of the government had been disappointing. The rising price of the dollar was benefitting some industrialists, he added.

Bhabha said Prime Minister Sharif had signed a Rs57 billion agreement with China for the Nandipur Project, which, he added, could have been completed in Rs22 billion. He said corrupt elements were involved in making the LNG import policy.

He said during his election campaign, the prime minister had said that he would invite his Indian counterpart to Pakistan to give Pakistan-India relations a fresh start. “But the situation on the Indo-Pak border has been getting worse since he took office,” Bhabha said.

He said the PTI had participated in the All Parties Conference to find a way to end terrorism, but there had been no development in this direction.

He said the PML-N-led government had already taken Rs5 billion from the International Monetary Fund. Yet, he said, they (government) talked about dignity and autonomy. “More loans mean accepting their harsher conditions,” Bhabha said.

He said the PTI had filed a petition at the Lahore High Court seeking orders for local body elections on party basis.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 3^rd, 2013.