JI announces it will attend PML-N's sit-in
28 January, 2013
ISLAMABAD: The Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) on Sunday decided to support and participate in the sit-in in front of the Parliament House as already announced by the PML-N. "We support every move which is aimed at strengthening the hands ofthe judiciary and the Election Commission of Pakistan," the JI general secretary Liaquat Baloch told our sources after receiving a call from the opposition leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan. He said the PML-N would announce the date of the sit-in after consulting the JI leadership. The announcement by the JI, which is not represented in parliament but possess considerable street power, would give a big boost to the sit-in in front of the Parliament House and is also seen as a tactic to pressurise the government to hold timely elections under the consensus caretaker government and an independent ECP. Liaquat Baloch said that Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Sunday called him and asked him to send proposed names for the caretaker set ups in the centre and provinces in the next two days. Baloch said Nisar also apprised him of his party's programme to hold a sit-in in front of the Parliament House. The two leaders also observed that the directives of the ECP regarding scrutiny of voters' lists in Karachi were also being violated and the government was fully responsible for this lawlessness while the decisions of the Supreme Court were also not been implemented. "I told him that the JI would participate in the sit-in as it is aimed at strengthening the hands of ECP and the judiciary," Baloch said. The Jamaat leader said that Chaudhry Nisar told him that they would announce a date of the sit-in in consultation with the JI leadership. Meanwhile, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan after accepting the proposal for the sit-in rejected it later on. A PTI spokesperson announced that his party would not join the PML-N's sit-in in Islamabad aimed at making the Election Commission of Pakistan free, independent and more powerful. He also rejected the proposed Bahawalpur South Punjab province, dubbing it another election stunt and gimmick of President Asif Ali Zardari. Imran also rejected the proposed inclusion of Mianwali, his native town, in the new province, which the commission on new provinces recommended in its report. "It is the people of Mianwali who will decide about their future and not a person sitting in the President House," he said in a statement issued here by the party's Media Centre. He charged that the commission's recommendations were thrashed out on the wishes of Zardari. Imran fully supported the decision of the people of Mianwali to stage a sit-in against the commission's recommendation to merge their district with the proposed province. The PTI chairman maintained that his party had already demanded the resignation of Zardari, as the general election in his presence, could not be free fair and transparent. He alleged Zardari was hatching conspiracies while sitting in the President House. End.
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