ISLAMABAD, Aug 11: Opposition parties on Thursday announced to launch ‘a movement for an active struggle against dictatorship from a single platform’ and said their lawmakers ‘might consider resigning from the assemblies’ as part of the movement.
The announcement was made by Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD) Chairman Makhdoom Amin Fahim at the conclusion of an all-party conference (APC) on the issue of ‘pre-poll rigging in local government elections’.
The APC was attended by representatives of 33 political parties and over a dozen lawyers and human rights organizations.
Accompanied by Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) Chairman Raja Zafarul Haq and Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed, Mr Fahim read out a joint declaration issued at the end of the APC.
He said it would be ensured through the movement that future general elections were held under an independent caretaker government and independent election commission.
Answering journalists’ questions, he said modalities for launching the movement would be finalized soon by the opposition parties.
Through the joint declaration, he said, the opposition parties demanded that references against the president, the prime minister, the chief ministers of Punjab and Sindh and the provincial and federal ministers be filed for violating the Code of Conduct for the local body polls so that ‘they are tried in court and punished according to law.’
The opposition parties called for appointment of a permanent chief election commissioner with consensus. They demanded that judges of higher judiciary should be administered a fresh oath under the 1973 Constitution to enable them to play their role according to the constitution rather than the whims of a particular person.
The APC demanded registration of cases against the nazims ‘found involved in misappropriation of Rs5 billion’ and their arrest.
They said those on whose recommendations, transfers and postings had been ordered after the announcement of the election schedule should also be prosecuted for the violation of the Code of Conduct.
Mr Fahim said the APC expressed deep concern over the fact that the government had turned the elections into a ‘farce’ by depriving the electorate of the fundamental right to freely elect candidates of their choice and to campaign for them.
The ARD chief said: “Instead of appointing a permanent chief election commissioner (CEC), Gen Musharraf has appointed an acting CEC who could be removed any time.”
He alleged that the president, the prime minister and the chief ministers of Punjab and Sindh were openly campaigning for their candidates with promising development projects worth billions of rupees.
“This policy of Gen Musharraf tends to turn the armed forces into a disreputable and controversial institution,” he said.
He said a large number of opposition candidates had been forced to withdraw nomination papers through ‘unconstitutional, illegal and immoral use of police, administrative machinery and intelligence agencies.
Mr Fahim said the APC participants regretted that the elections were not being held in the cantonment areas, although 98 per cent residents of the areas were civilians. Similarly, the federal capital Islamabad had been kept away from elections.
He said the sole purpose of the ‘fascist measures’ was to ‘abuse sanctity of ballot’ even at local body level and ‘to prevent a majority of the opposition supporters from representing the people’.
“(The president’s) remaining in uniform, the referendum drama of 2002, rigging of local body elections in 2000-01 and general elections 2002, creation of the Patriot group, manipulating the judiciary, changing three prime ministers in three years, inventing the National Security Council provide irrefutable testimony to Gen Musharraf’s disdain for democracy,” he said.
In view of the facts, he said, the APC had declared the current local body elections a negation of democracy.
Through a resolution, the APC condemned ‘indiscriminate and aggressive actions against madressahs and their foreign students throughout the country’.
Through another resolution, it demanded release of acting PML-N President Makhdoom Javed Hashmi, People’s Party Parliamentarians Vice-President Yousuf Raza Gilani and Mohajir Qaumi Movement (Haqiqi) leader Afaq Ahmed.
Prominent among those who attended the APC were Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Maulana Fazlur Rehman, PTI chief Imran Khan, Syed Fakhar Imam, JWP Senator Amanullah Kunrani, PPP Secretary-General Raja Pervez Ashraf, PML-N MNA Tehmina Daultana, ARD Coordinator Malik Hakmin Khan and HRCP director I. A. Rehman.
Asfandyar Wali of the Awami National Party did not participate in the APC on the ground that party had been facing hardships at the hands of the MMA government in the NWFP and the MMA had been invited to the conference.
