JI welcomes SC verdict on reserved seats

KARACHI: Central Chief of Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), Hafiz Naeemur Rehman on Saturday welcomed the Supreme Court’s verdict on the reserved seats, calling it a “fresh wave of air” for the country’s ailing democracy.

“The JI is holding a protest today across the country,” Hafiz Naeem told a news conference at Idara Noor-e-Haq, announcing that his party will rattle the capital city of Islamabad on July 26, 2024, with a “historic” sit-in.

“Form 45 is a constitutional document and it provides the basis for the constitution of a democratically elected government,” the JI Chief added.

He also attributed the stability of democracy to a judicial inquiry into the form 45 of the February 8 polls results, appealing to the apex court to found a commission in this connection.

Since the very evidence - the form 45 exists to nullify all prospects for the re-election in the country, he said, adding that “there is only way to scrape the fraudulent polls results by tallying the controversial form 47 to the form 45.”

He saw the election commission has lost its “moral grounds” after the apex court ruling on the reserved seats assigning then to the deserving party. He said that the commission should accept its failure and step down.

The denial of the reserved seats to the PTI backed political party in the assemblies - the Sunni Ittehad Council, he said, gave a huge advantage to those parties reached the parliament on form 47.

He identified the form 47 beneficiaries as those political parties standing with anti-establishment narratives initially but was gathered all illegally in the assembly and reaped the benefits of the stolen reserved seats.

Lashing out at the coalition government over excessively billing the electricity consumers, the central leader of the JI implicated the IMF as responsible for the ever soaring power tariffs in the country.

He also alleged the government for “kickbacks” from a particular sector to give rise to electricity rates, calling the independent power producers a “network of corruption”, plundering the nation under the head of capacity charges.

The IPPs have been receiving support from different governments since 1994, he said and called them “the biggest scams” in the country’s history.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024