KARACHI: Jamaat-i-Islami emir Sirajul Haq has said that Pakistan is not merely a piece of land but an ideo­logy and there is no place for traitors in the country.

Addressing a ‘Pakistan Zindabad Rally’ via telephone on Sunday, he said treason against Pakistan would actually be treason against the blood of martyrs, Mohajirs, Hijrat and the Quaid-i-Azam.

The rally was taken out from Gulshan-i-Iqbal near Urdu University Campus to the M.A. Jinnah Road.

Mr Haq said that people who sought help from Nato, United Nations and India, would not find a place to live in Pakistan and asked why the prime minister had not taken notice of it.

“We will protect Pakistan till the last drop of our blood. We are not against any community, but we are against corrupt oligarchy and oppressors. We are determined to turn Pakistan into an Islamic polity because solution of the country’s problems lies in the Islamic system of governance,” he said.

He invited youths to join Jamaat’s struggle and said successive governments, including military regimes, had failed to stop exploitation of people. “We will eliminate usury” after coming to power, he declared.

Mohammad Hussain Mehnati, another JI leader, said Pakistan came into being in the name of Islam and the Quaid-i-Azam had announced that the country’s constitution would be based on the Quran and Sunnah.

He said the JI had pledged to free the nation from what he called the US slavery.

Hafiz Naeemur Rehman said MQM chief Altaf Hussain had raised the slogan of the fifth nationality, getting an end to the quota system and repatriation of stranded Pakistanis from Bangladesh and did politics in the name of Mohajirs, but he left for London after forgetting all his commitments.

He praised security forces for restoring peace in Karachi and eliminating criminals through an indiscriminate operation.

Published in Dawn, August 10th, 2015

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