Accusing the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party of engaging in anti-national activities, disrupting law and order, and spreading misinformation, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has laid the ground for banning ex-PM Imran Khan’s party over the November 25 storming of the federal capital by thousands of PTI workers.
Sharif lambasted the opposition party, calling it a group of dissidents. “PTI is not a political party but a group of abettors, saboteurs, and miscreants that must be held accountable under the law,” he said. “It is our national duty to expose them; failing to do so will invite harsh judgment from history, and posterity will not forgive us.”
Chairing a high-level meeting to discuss the state of law and order, Sharif urged both the military and civilian leaderships to devise a strategy to prevent the PTI’s “invasion” of Islamabad to keep the nation’s peace.
The meeting was attended by members of the federal cabinet, Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, Chief of the Army Staff General Syed Asim Munir, senior government officers and representatives of law enforcement agencies, the Express Tribune reported.
“Pakistan’s image has been tarnished all over. This has been the third to fourth invasion against the federal capital during the past eight months by the PTI. There was no concept of such unholy acts and designs before 2014. It started in 2014 with the 126-day long sit-in that damaged the economy and country’s image,” said Sharif.
Sharif’s comments came a day after the Balochistan Assembly passed a resolution calling for banning the party for its “anti-Pakistan” actions. Likewise, a similar resolution was passed in the Punjab Assembly on Friday.
Calling the party “Tehreek-e-Takhreeb” (Insurgency Movement), Sharif reprimanded its leadership for repeatedly running over to Islamabad, accusing them of sabotaging the hard-earned peace, macroeconomic stability and revival of hefty foreign capital investments into the country.
“The country’s economy again witnessed a major blow as according to a conservative estimate such protests cause Rs190 billion per day loss to the national economy. The impact on exports, imports, production, services, and private businesses is huge,” Sharif said.
Reiterating that a PTI mob from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa invaded the capital with all the public resources of K-P provincial government, he said “If the country’s enemies are determined to sabotage our peace and prosperity, should we simply lie down like lame ducks and let them destroy everything?”
“This is the last thing we should even remotely imagine. We must make every effort to crush such hostile designs, as opportunities to safeguard the nation do not come twice,” he added.
Echoing the PM’s sentiment, the nation’s Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Attaullah Tarar stated on Saturday that nobody will be allowed to disturb the country’s peace. He accused PTI of spreading misinformation, using old pictures and AI generated images to show corpses to create a “false narrative” of shots being fired at party workers.
On Friday, the PTI confirmed that at least 12 party workers had died during the Islamabad protest.
PTI’s central spokesperson, Waqas Akram Sheikh, described the government’s actions as unprecedented in Pakistan’s history of protests. He alleged that journalists reporting about the fatalities during the Islamabad protest have been imprisoned, and that many others remain missing with no information about their whereabouts.
Sheikh claimed that the bodies of the deceased were withheld for three days before being returned to their families.
