MARDAN: Aman Jirga Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on Sunday staged a protest camp at the Pakistan Chowk here against the provincial government’s anti-encroachment drive.

They alleged that houses of poor citizens were being illegally demolished in the name of clearing roads and pathways of encroachments.

Those who attended the protest included jirga’s provincial president Syed Kamal Shah advocate, its provincial general secretary Arshad Manan advocate, district president Nishtar Khan, representatives of different traders’ unions and local leaders of different political parties.

Addressing the jirga, traders and political leaders said that the provincial government and its coalition partners had been wasting energies and time on non-issues. They lamented due to the ongoing anti-encroachment drive across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, traders and business community had suffered losses of millions of rupees.

“A single brick has not been removed so far in Nowshera district, which is the home town of Chief Minister Pervez Khattak,” they alleged, saying that a plaza owned by Mr Khattak and located along a roadside in the congested bazaar of Nowshera wasn’t razed.

They claimed that policies of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf were aimed at depriving poor people of means of livelihood. They asked the provincial rulers to stop anti-encroachment drive forthwith, otherwise, they would gather all the affected people across the province at a single platform to launch agitation against the government.

They said the affected people would also visit Nowshera in order to let the media know the double standards of the chief minister.

PROPERTY TAX: All Property Dealers Association, Mardan chapter, on Sunday staged a protest against raise in property tax by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government and announced to move court against the decision.

The property dealers demonstrated outside the local press club, and later held a news conference alleging injustices by the provincial government.

The association’s president Haji Nawab Ali, senior vice-president Ismail Khan, vice-president Mohammad Naeem Khan, general secretary Nawab Sher and others asked the provincial government to reverse the decision.

They said that the provincial government had increased property tax on residential houses from six to 100 per cent, on open plots up to 300 and on shops and business centres up to 400 per cent, respectively.

They said the increase in property tax had ruined their business, adding that they won’t register mutations of land property in revenue offices as a protest.

Published in Dawn, May 11th, 2015

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