ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Central Information Secretary Shireen Mazari on Sunday warned Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman of countrywide protests by women over his remarks made against the women participants of the party’s sit-in, DawnNews reported.
Addressing a press conference in the federal capital city, Mazari termed the remarks made by the JUI-F chief as 'uncivil' and said that Fazl should be aware that the country’s population constituted of 51 per cent women.
Mazari's response follows closely after a ruckus in the K-P assembly, when Opposition leader Maulana Lutfur Rehman’s fierce remarks against women workers of PTI resulted in lawmakers from both sides using abusive and un-parliamentary language against each other. “He (Maulana Fazlur Rehman) has rightly said that daughters of the nation have been made to dance in PTI sit-ins,” the opposition leader had said. His incendiary comments triggered a commotion in the house by angering treasury members, who demanded that the opposition leader withdraw his remarks about women.
Speaking today, Mazari said that the education budget of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had allocated 70 per cent funds for women' education and added that, "PTI was providing women with their rights which was causing Maulana Fazl to have a heart attack."
The PTI's central information secretary criticised NGOs and women lawmakers because of their their 'silence over the JUI-F chief’s remarks' against the participants of the PTI sit-in.
"Why are they sitting in assemblies if they cannot raise their voice for the rights of women," she said while talking about the women legislators sitting in assemblies.
Mazari said that Maulana Fazlur Rehman had used derogatory language against women which was intolerable and issued a 'final warning' to the JUI-F chief.
She said that, “women would raise their voice against Fazl, take to the streets and expose his corruption in case he failed to curb his anti-women statements.”
The JUI-F in August had held rallies across Sindh against PTI chairman Imran Khan for hurling wild allegations and using unparliamentary language against Maulana Fazlur Rehman.
The rallies had also condemned PTI women workers and supporters for 'signing and dancing in the streets of Islamabad as being shown live by TV channels'.
