ISLAMABAD: Former president Asif Ali Zardari has shown serious concern over the incident in Quetta in which a fast-moving vehicle ran over a traffic warden on duty and called for a thorough investigation to lay to rest speculation about a cover-up.

Spokesperson Senator Farhatullah Babar said that the former president, who is in London, expressed profound grief and shock over the death of Sub-Inspector Haji Attaullah Dashti and the questionable manner in which the case was dealt with.

Details of the case emerged when the social media ran the CCTV footage appearing to show a rashly driven vehicle running over a police warden. Police, however, registered a case of the traffic accident against unidentified persons, he said.

“There is a serious inconsistency between the gravity of the incident on the one hand and investigations and case registration on the other that smacks of a deliberate cover-up,” Mr Zardari said.

The former president said that the police warden was run over on Tuesday and CCTV footage was available yet it was not pursued in a normal course and no explanations having been offered also raised questions that needed answers.

The fact that the politically influential owner of the vehicle initially chose to remain silent and spoke up only after the footage went viral on social media further lent credence to suspicions of political pressure to hush up the incident, he said.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2017