PESHAWAR: Awami National Party senior vice president Ameer Haider Khan Hoti has said that his party will not accept results if the upcoming general elections are rigged.

Addressing a workers convention here on Sunday evening, he said that government should hold two former chief ministers, Pervez Khattak and Mahmood Khan, accountable before elections. He said that accountability of the two former chief ministers was must to ensure free, fair and impartial polls.

According to a statement issued here on Monday, Mr Hoti said that results of only free and fair elections would be acceptable. “Only fair and transparent elections instead of selection can be useful for the country,” he said. He added it was bad fortune of Pakhtuns that their land was always used for every new experiment.

He alleged that a conspiracy against Pakhtuns in the shape of Imran was hatched by Gen Pasha, Gen Zaheer and Gen Faiz. Now another conspiracy was being hatched against Pakhtunkhwa under the leadership of two former chief ministers, he added.

“There is an ideological difference with Imran Khan, but what his party’s former chief ministers Mahmood Khan and Parvez Khattak have done is in front of everyone. The former chief ministers should be held accountable for the damage caused to the province during their tenures,” he said.

The ANP leader said that there was an environment of mourning in the province due to death of former caretaker chief minister Azam Khan but the governor did not wait even for three days and nominated a new caretaker chief minister.

“What was the compulsion of the governor,” he questioned. He said that in the current situation, Supreme Court should have been approached for guidance about appointment of a new caretaker chief minister.

Mr Hoti, who is also a former chief minister, said that in 2013 elections his party was kept out of parliament through terrorism and in 2018 through rigging. “ANP has not forgotten the conspiracies against it in the last two elections. The plan to rig the elections will be someone’s wrong imagination,” he added.

About his party’s manifesto, he said that if his party was voted to power, it would provide free education to students in public sector universities. He said that ANP would implement a modern system of education and health in the province.

The ANP leader said that his party would ensure realisation of new National Finance Commission award and getting net profit of electricity and natural gas for the province. He said that ANP would get all rights for the province from centre under 18th Amendment.

He said that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was producing hydropower but it was still deprived of electricity. He said that selling hydropower to people at the price of oil-generated electricity was a real theft. “Those, who accuse Pakhtuns of stealing electricity, should listen that if Pakhtuns are given their electricity at legitimate price, there will be no need to steal electricity,” he said.

Mr Hoti also expressed concerns over increase in prices of gas and power and said that the caretaker government had no justification to increase rates of those commodities.

ANP provincial senior vice president and candidate for PK-76 Advocate Khushdil Khan and former tehsil candidate Ghazanfar Ali also addressed the convention. A number of workers of different parties joined ANP on the occasion.

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2023