F.P. Report
LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan announced Saturday that starting next week, his party would hold rallies every day till May 14 — when elections to the Punjab Assembly are scheduled to be held on the Supreme Court’s order. He made the announcement in an address to workers at a rally at Lahore’s Lakshmi Chowk metro station held to “support the Constitution, Supreme Court, and the chief justice of Pakistan”.
The PTI held rallies in four cities — Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad, and Peshawar. “It is the entire nation’s decision to stand with the Constitution and [against] the way this mafia is putting pressure on and doing propaganda against the chief justice and [other] judges,” Khan said while referring to the incumbent coalition government.
Announcing the plan for daily rallies, the PTI chairman said he would come out and prepare the public to protest if elections were not held.
“When a country’s Constitution is violated, it means the justice system and the rule of law have ended. Most of all, it means that the nation has lost its freedom and become slaves. “We will not rest till elections are held and Pakistan is free,” he stressed.
Referring to Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari’s recent visit to India to attend a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), Khan said the way the former was treated by his Indian counterpart was a “matter of shame for all of us”. Khan also addressed remarks made by Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, who called Bilawal “a promoter, justifier, and spokesperson of a terrorism industry which is the mainstay of Pakistan”.
“Do you (Jaishankar) have no manners or etiquette? A guest comes to your country … inviting him and insulting him reflects on your country,” Khan said.
