February 10, 2008	Sunday	Safar 02, 1429

LAHORE, Feb 9: The VVIP movement once again played havoc with the city traffic on Saturday.

Ambulances were also seen stuck in traffic jams, thanks to the protocol and security cover being extended to important personalities.

Caretaker Prime Minister Muhammadmian Soomro, who was in the city, visited three places to attend official functions. Caretaker CM Ijaz Nisar and former chief minister Pervaiz Elahi also frequented the city roads at the cost of motorists.

Chief of Army Staff Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kiani also arrived in the afternoon and visited a hotel on The Mall in the evening, sources told Dawn.

The VVIP movement continued from dawn to dusk. Whenever a VVIP motorcade moved, traffic on his route and adjacent arteries came to a halt. As the traffic police struggled to clear the mess, another VVIP movement would nullify their efforts.

As such The Mall, Jail Road, Canal Road, Ferozpur Road, Gulberg and Garden Town main boulevards witnessed several traffic jams throughout the day.

In the morning, traffic blockade was witnessed on Canal Road from Thokar Niaz Beg to Lahore High Court on The Mall when the chief minister left his Johar Town residence to attend a ceremony on Fane Road.

Later, he reached the Governor’s House from where Mr Soomro and the chief minister reached Alhamra to attend a function. Both the VVIPs later visited the Jinnah Hospital in Faisal Town via Canal Road.

The prime minister once again used the Canal Road to reach his 92-Canal Road residence near FC College from where he again left for the Governor’s House in the evening.

Former chief minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, who also moves with full protocol, reached Old Airport from his Zahoor Elahi Road residence.

Some of the motorists stuck in the pile-up made calls to newspaper offices to convey their agony.

“I have been stuck in front of Iranian Cultural Centre on Jail Road for the last 20 minutes and traffic is jammed on both sides and also on Canal Road,” a motorist Zeeshan Alam told this reporter by phone.

An ambulance carrying a 27-year-old patient to the Lahore General Hospital on Ferozpur Road, who sustained critical head injury in a road accident on Sheikhupura Road, got stuck on Jail Road for at least 20 minutes, he said.

Another motorist Noman Hyder said he had to face a great deal of inconvenience on The Mall near Neela Gumbad at around 3pm and managed to reach Alhamra in 30 minutes.

Later, he again got trapped in a long queue near GOR-1 Chowk for at least 15 minutes.

Police sources regretted that they kept running from one point to another along with the VVIPs the whole day.

Meanwhile, army troops were deployed in large numbers in Cantonment at the arrival of the COAS in the city.