Intra-party polls: Jamaat-e-Islami elects new provincial heads

Oath-taking ceremony to be held on October 21

LAHORE: After an intra-party electoral exercise that kicked off around two months ago, the Jamaat-e-Islami announced its new provincial heads on Thursday.

Mian Maqsood Ahmed has been elected as the party’s Punjab chief, Mushtaq Ahmed Khan as the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa chief, Dr Merajul Huda as the Sindh chief and Maulana Abdul Haq Hashmi as the Balochistan chief.

JI chief Sirajul Haq will administer oath to the newly-elected provincial heads of the party on October 21 at JI headquarters in Lahore’s Mansoorah suburb.

Addressing the party’s central leaders at the head office on Thursday, JI chief Sirajul Haq said the country’s politics and so-called democracy were protecting the interests of the elite, as they had become tools for making money.

He said the poor could only watch the game of politics but not participate, as the politicians’ sole objective was to squeeze whatever they could out of the majority to benefit a few elite families.

Haq said the taxpayers were being forced to commit suicides while the elite were leading luxurious lives. “The pro-status quo forces want to keep the masses as slaves, and the common man cannot get any opportunity to progress.”

He said that whenever someone from the elite class was hauled up before a judge in a mega corruption case, the democratic setup seemed to be in danger. “The situation demands that the public break the hold of the corrupt elite and support the JI for establishing an Islamic system in the country.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 16^th, 2015.