JUIF to launch protest drive against ‘rigging’ in KP

PESHAWAR: The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUIF) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter on Saturday rejected the election results and announced to launch a protest campaign against the alleged rigging in the February 8 polls.

Speaking at a press conference, JUIF provincial president Maulana Ataur Rahman said that his party was staging the protest in KP against the PTI and the institutions for their bid to push JUIF to the wall and impose the elements, who “plundered” the province for 10 years. “The person, who is being projected as chief minister of the province, is known to all. Everyone is aware of his deeds and character,” he said.

JUIF provincial secretary general Ataul Haq Darvesh, secretary information Abdul Jalil Jan and other leaders of the party were also present.

The Maulana alleged that the nominated chief minister of the province was directly involved in the May 9 mayhem. “He was responsible for “attacking” institutions and bureaucracy. The institutions were holding meetings with him, which was tantamount to burying the narrative of May 9 and impose these elements once again on the province,” he said.

“JUIF would challenge this attitude of the institutions and would make it clear as with whom the nation was standing and who were being imposed on them against their will,” he added.

He said that a meeting of the provincial shura, district leadership of the party, elected representatives and party candidates in the elections would be held in the provincial metropolis on February 27 wherein date and details for the protest campaign would be given.

He said that there were complaints against the invisible forces but this time all their records of rigging were broken. JUI is against the elements who were being brought to power by the invisible forces, he said.

Regarding the PTI delegation’s meeting with Maulana Fazlur Rahman, he said the JUIF chief was a seasoned politician of national level who welcomed even his enemies at his home. “A meeting with the PTI delegation doesn’t mean that JUIF has stepped back from its principled stance. How can we change our standpoint against the people who pushed the province to the quagmire during their 10-year rule?” he asked.

He said the institutions had nothing to do with elections. “The invisible forces are trying to push things to a point of no return. Such acts cause debacles of states. The invisible forces have planned to repeat the 1971 situation by stealing the mandate of the actual winners,” he said.