PESHAWAR: PTI workers have expressed dissatisfaction over the process of selection of candidates for the local government elections and alleged that some lawmakers are trying to field their relatives by ignoring senior party activists.

“We will observe sit-in outside the building of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly and will also move to Bani Gala in case the party provincial leadership doesn’t do justice with us,” said PTI office-bearers in PK-6 constituency during a press conference at Peshawar Press Club on Wednesday.

The office-bearers of PTI, Insaf Students Federation and Insaf Youth Wing, led by Sher Ali Afridi, Lal Zaman and Faisal Iqbal, said that provincial general secretary of the party, Khalid Masood, had announced committees for selection of candidates but many of senior members were ignored in the process.

“We are not invited to the meetings and all the decisions are taken by MPAs Fazal Ilahi, Ishtiaq Ormar and Shah Farman without informing the office-bearers of the party. It means that the party will stand divided in the elections,” they said.

They said that PTI chairman Imran Khan had promised them that 25 per cent quota of tickets for the local government elections would be allotted to the youth wing but in the prevailing situation the youth were totally ignored.

Blaming the MPAs, they said that names of the candidates had been kept secret and not disclosed to all the members of the selection committee because the workers were not ready to accept any outsider as their candidate in the elections.

They said that majority of the members of PTI youth wing were educated but the lawmakers were ignoring them. “We will not work for the blue eyed persons, personal servants and relatives of the MPAs if fielded in the elections,” they said.

Published in Dawn, April 23rd, 2015

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