The opposition parties held a series of rallies across the country on Thursday to observe ‘Black Day’, a year after the general elections 2018 in which the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) emerged victorious.
The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Jamiat Ulema Islam-Fazl (JUI-F), Awami National Party (ANP) and other opposition parties held rallies in different cities, including Lahore, Peshawar, Dera Ghazi Khan, Multan, Sukkur, Tando Allahyar, Karachi and Quetta.
Addressing a rally in Peshawar, PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal said the opposition has become ‘Great Wall of China’ in an effort to save the constitution from the government. He slammed the government’s economic policies saying that the growth rate during the PML-N tenure was 3.5% which has now reduced to 3%.
Iqbal stressed that businesses were shutting down increasing unemployment in the country. He maintained that Nawaz brought the country out of the time when there were bomb blasts on a daily basis. He further said the government has backtracked from all of its promises.
In a similar vein, ANP chief Asfandyar Wali Khan called the incumbent government ‘selected’. “No matter how many times the National Assembly speaker restricts us from calling it a selected government, we will call it what it is,” he said. Responding to allegations of him possessing undeclared overseas assets, the ANP chief said he should be prosecuted if anything is proven against him.
He reiterated that stability in Afghanistan will bring peace in Pakistan. JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman also supported Asfandyar’s statement saying that Imran Khan is not the country’s leader. “We [opposition] need to get the country out of the current economic crisis,” he added.
Speaking to media alongside PPP leader Khursheed Shah, PML-N’s Ayaz Sadiq said the opposition parties are not afraid of prisons. “We will go to jail to save democracy, but we will not change our loyalties,” he lamented. Talking about media blackout, Sadiq said Imran Khan lied about it on his visit to the United States.
Local leaders and workers of the PML-N carried out a protest rally in front of the National Press Club in Islamabad. Participants of the rally, which included local leaders of the JUI-F and PkMAP, chanted slogans against Prime Minister Imran and his government. Police and other security personnel were present at the protest site.
Addressing the rally, PkMAP Islamabad President Abdul Qayyum Achakzai alleged that the PTI government had promised ‘change’ but instead it imposed taxes worth Rs 750 billion on the people after coming into power. He claimed that supporters of his party were unable to join the opposition rally in Balochistan because roads across the province had allegedly been blocked. “We strongly condemn [the move],” he added.
The opposition rallies coincide with Prime Minister Imran Khan’s return from an official working visit to the United States, which has largely been seen as a diplomatic win for the government.
The prime minister, while addressing a large crowd at a community event at Washington’s Capital One Arena on his first day in the US, had gone after opposition leaders and threatened to ‘take away’ their prison facilities. “They will stay there as long as they do not return the money they have looted,” Imran had thundered to a charged audience.
Opposition parties had lambasted Prime Minister Imran over his speech and termed it ‘provocative, anarchic and full of venom’.
