PESHAWAR, Dec 10: Jamaat-i-Islami candidates will withdraw their nomination papers on Saturday and conventions of the party’s workers will be held at the district level in the NWFP.

Provincial JI chief Sirajul Haq said at a news conference at the Peshawar Press Club on Monday that that the ‘farcical exercise’ of elections would strengthen dictatorship.

He said the party would hold protest rallies and meetings and organise a ‘boycott caravan’, while its supporters would hoist black flags on their homes and workplaces from Dec 16, 2007, to Jan 5, 2008.

He said the JI would distribute pamphlets urging people to boycott the elections and hold conventions at the union council level across the province. A camp would be set up from Dec 25 to Jan 5 outside the press club, he said.

He said the political parties taking part in elections would betray the forces struggling for restoration of democracy and reinstatement of the deposed judges.

Sirajul Haq alleged that the ‘drama’ being staged in the name of elections on Jan 8 was part of a plan to deprive of the nation of true democracy, independent judiciary and free media.

He said that besides the Jamaat and Tehrik-i-Insaf candidates of the Pakistan Oppressed Nations’ Movement would also boycott the elections.

He said the decision to boycott the elections was not easy but it reflected the aspirations of the people.

The provincial JI chief demanded that the government should lift emergency, restore the Constitution, annul the Provisional Constitution Order, restore the status of the Supreme Court as it was before Nov 3, reinstate Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry and other judges, rescind the laws gagging the press and constitute an independent election commission.

The provincial JI chief said the elections could not be termed free and fair unless all the parties were provided a level playing field.

He alleged that partisan caretaker governments had been installed.