Protesting against the protest: PTI, PAT demonstrations not ‘sitting in’ well with JUI-F

Party’s provincial chief Maulana Gul Naseeb Khan leads rally against Imran, Qadri.

PESHAWAR/CHARSADDA:

While Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and Pakistan Awami Tehreek are busy demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the federal capital, the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) decided to hold a demonstration of their own on Friday against the Islamabad sit-ins.

Calling the Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri-led demonstrations unconstitutional, JUI-F’s provincial ameer Maulana Gul Naseeb Khan addressed protesters gathered at Shoba Chowk. The protest was organised on the call of the party’s central ameer Maulana Fazlur Rehman.



Participants marched from Namak Mandi to Shoba Chowk where Gul Naseeb, JUI-F general secretary Maulana Shujaul Mulk, district ameer Maulana Khairul Bashar and district general secretary Maulana Amanullah spoke.

Naseeb termed the demands of the PTI and PAT chiefs unfair. “Imran Khan’s call for civil disobedience means rejecting all state institutions,” he said. The JUI-F leader said the whole nation had rejected the long march of Imran Khan and his party stood with them. The provincial chief stressed that his party would guard the 1973 Constitution at all costs. He reiterated that PAT and PTI had chosen the wrong path to oust an elected prime minister.

Naseeb pointed out that instead of gathering millions of supporters, Imran managed to draw only a few thousand to the capital.

He said the law and order situation in K-P was deteriorating with each passing day and the PTI government was taking little or no action against extortionists, target killers and kidnappers. The JUI-F leader said Imran had made tall claims of changing peoples’ fortunes, but had done nothing for the province.

Also speaking on the occasion, JUI-F provincial general secretary Maulana Shujaul Mulk said his party was working towards strengthening democracy and democratic institutions. “We are not power hungry,” he asserted.

Other party leaders rhetorically asked if K-P Chief Minister Pervez Khattak would allow staging a sit-in calling for his removal in front of his official residence.

Meanwhile, the JUI-F Charsadda chapter also organised a rally against the PTI and PAT long marches. MNA Maulana Gohar Shah organised the rally at Farooq Azam Square in Charsadda, where demonstrators chanted slogans against Imran Khan and Qadri.  They called on the PTI leader to end his rally otherwise JUI-F workers would be forced to intervene.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 23^rd, 2014.