April 30, 2007	Monday	Rabi-us-Sani 12, 1428

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LAHORE, April 29: An 'ulema and mashaikh' convention, held here on Sunday by the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, called upon religious scholars in seminaries and 'khanqahs' to join the MMA's struggle as a religious duty.

"People want a radical change but the country is facing a leadership vacuum which the seminaries and ulema and mashaikh can fill because of their direct contact with the people," MMA president Qazi Hussain Ahmad said in his concluding address.

He said he was shocked by the suicide attack on a public meeting in Charsadda and said that if the interior minister could be targeted then all claims about improvement in law and order seemed to be hollow.

The convention passed a resolution saying that the bomb blast, which killed more than 30 people, was a clear evidence of the failure of the government which must resign and pave way for a caretaker government of national consensus.

Qazi Hussain said religious scholars would have to render sacrifices for the enforcement of Sharia and they had no other option but to join the MMA.

He said the military dictatorship was ruling with the help of intelligence agencies. The regime, he said, did not want to transfer power to elected institutions, not even to parliament and maintained only a civilian facade.

The MMA president later said that the religious alliance would urge PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto not to join hands with Gen Pervez Musharraf and instead help the MMA in forging a grand opposition alliance for removing undemocratic forces from the political scene.

He said the PPP had made a valuable contribution for the democratic system and it would be a misfortune if its leader chose to strike a deal with the regime.

He said the MMA was yet to work out a strategy to prevent Gen Musharraf from being re-elected from the current assemblies and such a policy would be devised soon. He said seeking dissolution of the NWFP Assembly and parting ways with the coalition in Balochistan were major issues to be considered for the strategy.

MMA Secretary-General Maulana Fazlur Rehman told the convention that the alliance stood for a change of the system within the parameters of the 1973 Constitution with the objective of enforcing Sharia.

He said forces opposed to the MMA were in effect supporting western conspiracy of damaging the social and cultural fabric of the Muslim world. He said the MMA was seeking change through peaceful and political means and not with the use of force.

He said that Benazir Bhutto appeared to be interested in petty political gains, like getting rid of charges of corruption she and her husband had been facing for years.

The Maulana dealt at length with the policies of the MMA government in the NWFP, and said that the law and order situation in the province was the best in the country. But, he said, certain forces were now out to destabilise the MMA government by hatching conspiracies to disrupt peace in the province.

Pir Abdur Rahim Naqshbanndi, Amir of the JUI; Prof Sajhid Mir, Amir of Jamiat Ahl-i-Hadith; Sahibzada Shah Mohammad Ans Noorani, Amir of Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Pakistan, and Maulana Abdul Jalil Naqvi of the Pakistan Islami Tehrik also spoke at the convention.