LAHORE, May 27: The Supreme Council, a body comprising 10 organisations of the Ahle Sunnat sect, on Sunday called on the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal to quit the NWFP government and the ruling coalition in Balochistan if it really wanted to support the lawyers’ movement.

Speaking at a “Pakistan Bachao Convention”, MNAs Sahibzada Fazli Karim of the Markazi Jamaat Ahle Sunnat, Sahibzada Dr Abul Khair Zubair of the Jamiat Ulema-I-Pakistan and Khawaja Saad Rafiq of the PML-N and others said that the MMA government in the NWFP and its presence in Balochistan’s coalition was weakening the democratic movement which had emerged as a national campaign second only to the Pakistan Movement.

The religious alliance, they said, had so far shown no signs of parting ways with the regime and was vulnerable to all temptations attached to power politics.

“If the MMA wants to really establish its credibility as an organisation interested in restoring democracy, see the judiciary as an independent state institution and ensure the functioning of other constitutional organs of the state, it will have to show sincerity by leaving the two provincial governments,” Sahibazada Fazle Karim told the convention that was chaired by Pir Syed Amirul Hasnat at the Jamia Naeemia. .

“Keeping the democratic movement intact and also riding the government’s bandwagon at the same time can not go together,” he added.

Dr Sarfraz Naeemi, the administrator of the Jamia, Engineer Sarwat Ejaz, Dr Azhar Mahmmod, Maulana Ghulam Mohammad, Mohammad Ziaul Haq Naqshbandi and Mohammad Nawaz Kharal also spoke at the convention which adopted a declaration seeking Gen Pervez Musharraf’s ouster and the establishment of a government of national consensus to hold the next general election.

The declaration also demanded that the Election Commission of Pakistan be reconstituted, and given the power to check all electoral irregularities, enabling it to hold a fair election to help ensure undiluted and vibrant democracy.

Hundreds of the people, some of them even coming from remote parts of the country, attended the convention.

The participants kept on raising slogans against the government seeking its dismissal.

Other speakers alleged the ruler had destroyed institutions and were bent upon dispensing with the Islamic identity of the country in accordance with what they called the American agenda.

Such a trend, they said, was manifest from the regime’s `secular and anti-Islam’ policies, and vowed to resist such moves with all force.

Declaring ‘jihad’ on the regime, they said every seminary, every mosque and ‘khanqah’ would now serve as a ‘front’ in the ‘holy war against the unholy rule’.

They also criticised President Musharraf for `patronizing’ the MQM which they branded as a terrorist organisation.

They announce unqualified support to the lawyers’ movement and decided that the Ahle Sunnat workers would participate in their rallies allover the country. They decided that its workers would join lawyers in their nationwide rallies on June 13.

They also announced that the Ahle Sunnat workers would hold demonstration as and when any minister would visit a district.

The convention, organised by 10 Ahle Sunnat organisations forming the supreme council, decided to hold another session on June 13 to work out the future line of action.