LAHORE - A crucial session of Jamaat-e-Islami’s Central Shoora – the supreme decision-making body – which was held at Mansoora Tuesday was far from a monotonous event as some of its members opposed Jamaat’s role as a mediator on the ground that nothing fruitful had been being achieved.
While talking to this newspaper, a senior leader of the party said some of the members of the Shoora expressed their reservations over JI’s role as a peacemaker persistently for an indefinite time.
JI Amir Sirajul Haq took the members of the Shoora into confidence over the progress made so far and the hitches along the way,” he said. He admitted that some of the members were not pleased with the party’s role as a mediator.
“During the course of the meeting, some of the members became despondent,” the official said without naming anyone.
He, however, said the JI would still continue to work for the settlement of the conflict.
There are hardened positions for which there does not seem to be any alternative, he said, referring to PTI’s uncompromising stance on Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s resignation and the government’s firm decision not even to negotiate the demand.
He said these barriers generated despondency among the members of the Shoora and sparked some of them to call upon the party to back out.
Earlier in the day, JI Ameer Sirajul Haq, while talking to media persons at Mansoora, said Islamabad was being ruled by the rulers in the morning and by the participants of the sit-ins in the night – the pessimism that was reflected at the Shoora’s meeting.
“For Pakistan’s integrity and supremacy of the Constitution and democracy, all the three players will have to shun their ego,” he said. “The government’s besetting sin is that it always keeps sleeping until the last moment,” he said, while referring to the government’s lackluster position vis-à-vis the Model Town tragedy and the floods’ calamity. “As of now, it is procrastinating on the issue of election rigging and the killings witnessed by Pakistan Awami Tehreek in Model Town, as a result of which the situation has entered a blind alley.” he said.
Though he did display a sense of pessimism he was not completely disappointed with the Jamaat’s role as a mediator. The Political Jirga’s achievement is that it has been able to bring the players who did not even like to talk to each other to the conference table,” he said, adding a total of 37 rounds of negotiations had so far been held.
“It is for the first time that all the political parties have joined hands in order to strengthen democracy. The Political Jirga has been formed with the consent of all the political parties, the JI amir said.”
“We want to see the participants returning to their homes happily,” he said, holding that if all the institutions of the state work within their limits, things will not come to such an extent. He urged the players to soften their stance, warning if they failed to do so the Political Jirga would take the issue to the people.
When a journalist asked him what role the JI would be playing on the issue of Kalabagh Dam, he parried the question by saying, “Water reservoirs must be built in the country and our stance on Kalabagh Dam is not different from that of other parties.” He bemoaned lack of precautionary measures on the part of the federal government to cope with the floods and urged JI and Al-Khidmat Foundation workers to help the flood victims devotedly.