HYDERABAD, Sept 6: Supporting the strike call given by the National Leaders’ Conference for September 9, an all-parties conference held at the press club here on Tuesday rejected results of the local body elections.

The conference, convened by the Jamaat-i-Islami and attended by almost all opposition parties, demanded that a new chief election commissioner be appointed and re-election be held after taking parliament into confidence.

The conference was presided over by a central leader of the MMA and JI secretary-general Syed Munawar Hassan.

It adopted a joint communiqué which termed use of the state machinery in the local body elections as illegal and said it bulldozed democracy and sanctity of the ballot.

It demanded that all false cases against opposition candidates be withdrawn and Manthar Jatoi and Jeeando Soomro, two nazim candidates of the city, and a social worker Hafees Deswali be released.

It supported the Islamabad declaration of the National Leaders’ Conference and appealed to the people to observe a complete strike in the country on September 9.

It condemned the meeting between the Pakistani foreign minister and the Israeli foreign minister, saying it was tantamount to rubbing salt in the wounds of Palestinians.

Expressing concern over hyperinflation and an inordinate increase in oil prices and utilities and consumers goods, it demanded that the prices of commodities be brought down to the level of 1999.

Speaking on the occasion, Syed Munawar Hassan said only simple rigging had taken place in Punjab but an element of terror was included in Sindh elections.

He said General Pervez Musharraf was the first person to congratulate MQM chief Altaf Hussain on the Muttahida’s ‘victory’.

PPP leader and MPA Zahid Bhurgari termed the local body elections as a farce and said Awam Dost candidates in Hyderabad city were sent coffins to intimidate them.

MMA leader and MPA Rehman Rajput said during the elections the army had wasted petrol on patrolling.

JUI-S leader Maulana Shabbir Ahmed, JUI-F leader Maulana Taj Mohammad Nahiyoo, Jafria Alliance leader Nizamul Haideri, PML-N leader Afzal Gujjar, Awami Tehrik’s Abrar Qazi, Dr Abdul Samad of the Tehrik-i-Insaaf, NLF provincial president Rana Mehmood Ali Khan, Hyderabad District Bar Association president Bashir Gujjar and others spoke on the occasion.