Imran Khan threatens protest against rigging

Published June 11, 2013
Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan.—File Photo
Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan.—File Photo

LAHORE: Showing his distrust in the institutions of judiciary and Election Commission, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf has threatened to launch a protest campaign after Eid if its reservations about the election results are not removed.

“We’ll take to the streets after Eid if poll rigging is not investigated in a transparent manner,” Imran Khan said at a press conference on Monday.

The PTI chief, who has yet to take oath as MNA, said he would raise the issue in his maiden speech in the National Assembly.

He said it was baffling that the PML-N, which had obtained only 6.8 million votes when it was at the peak of its popularity (in 1997), managed to secure 10.4 million votes in the May 11 elections.

Mr Khan, who had been a staunch supporter of the judiciary and Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, said both the judiciary and the Election Commission had disappointed him. “The ‘umpires’ did not remain neutral and impartial in the electoral match.”

Admitting that his party lost the elections because it could not make an appropriate polling day plan, he said benefiting from the access to information law under the 18th Amendment, the PTI would obtain the count of ballot paper counterfoils to expose rigging.

Mr Khan claimed that a conspiracy had been hatched to assassinate him on the GT Road during an election rally.

In reply to a question, he said the PML-N would have to devolve powers for good governance and make police and bureaucracy independent.

About US drone attacks, he alleged that these were targeting the same group of people who were being killed in army operations, giving an impression that Pakistan was fighting the American war. He pledged to tackle the cancer of terrorism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

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