LAHORE   -   Senator Sirajul Haq took oath as ameer of Jamat-e-Islami for five year term at a ceremony at Mansoora ground on Tuesday afternoon.

Representatives from different political and religious parties, lawyers, workers, media men and JI leaders and workers attended simple but impressive ceremony.

Addressing the ceremony after taking oath, Sirajul Haq alleged that the last general elections were massively rigged in favor of those loyal to the actual rulers. Apparently the government was run by politicians, he said, but the actual power was in the hands of non political masters.

Sirajul Haq said that the all military rulers from Ayub Khan to Pervez Musharraf had harmed the democratic system, the constitution, the parliament, the judiciary and the country’s image only for personal ends and to perpetuate their rule. He said that the legislature, judiciary, executive and the government were helpless and the foreign and the domestic policies were ineffective. He said that presence of about a dozen ministers of the Musharraf regime in the present cabinet was a mockery of democracy. He said the JI wanted rule of the constitution and the law in the country.

He said that the nation had always exercised vote in search of betterment. It voted the PPP and the PML-N for their rights and for the solution of their problems but all in vain. He said the people had voted for the PTI but it too had not come up to the expectations. He said the JI was the first to launch a campaign against corruption and by now, the nation had made it its narrative. He said the JI wanted across the board accountability and recovery of the ill-gotten wealth from the plunderers. He said if the corrupt were subjected to a court trial instead of media trial, nobody would be able to raise a finger.  He urged the government to check price spiral and termed it worst form of terrorism.

Sirajul Haq said the JI was in favour of dialogue and good relations with New Delhi. But, he said, the exercise would be futile until India pulled out its troops from Kashmir. He paid tributes to the PAF pilots who shot down two Indian fighters thus causing humiliation to the Indian jingoism. Supporting Doha talks, he said the world colonialism should learn a lesson from Nato’s defeat in Afghanistan.

He said that faith could not be defeated by gunpowder and military might. He further said that Afghanistan could not be left at the mercy of India. He urged Islamabad to adopt an effective strategy for friendly relations with Kabul. He paid rich tributes to the martyrs of the armed forces.

The JI chief also saluted the Prime Minister of New Zealand for her stance following terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch.