LOWER DIR: Jamaat-i-Islami chief Sirajul Haq on Wednesday said his party wanted the change of the system rather than an individual so the country could be made a true Islamic welfare state.

Addressing a JI workers’ meeting and later talking to mediapersons in Nasafa area of Talash, he said enforcement of Sharia in true sense was the only solution to the problems the country was facing.

Earlier, a number of families from different villages of Noorakhel Talash quit PPP, PTI and other parties and joined the Jamaat.

Mr Haq said JI wanted fresh general elections in the country so a new government could be formed with the real mandate of the people. He said ‘one-man show’ was the real reason for the PTI’s failure. He said forward blocks in the ruling PTI had surfaced and that the days of Imran Khan’s rule were numbered.

He said JI’s protest sit-ins against inflation, unemployment and corruption would continue across the country. He said the JI would continue its struggle for elimination of interest-based economy and co-education.

Mr Haq claimed the JI had given tickets for the local body elections to honest, sincere, truthful and pious people, and hoped the people would vote for them.

The JI chief said a separate medical college and a university for women were established during the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

PPP INDEPENDENT: Pakistan Peoples Party’s district senior vice-president Mohammad Israr, who is contesting the local body elections for the Timergara tehsil top slot as an independent, on Wednesday vowed he won’t withdraw from the poll race.

Addressing supporters after inaugurating his election office in Shamshi Khan area of Talash, he said he along with his supporters would continue the struggle for restoration of democratic principles in the party.

Published in Dawn, March 10th, 2022