LAHORE - After postponement of scheduled protest of Alliance for Free and Fair Elections outside Provincial Election Commission, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) staged a demonstration outside Jamaat-e-Islami office on Lytton Road on Thursday to protest against alleged rigging in general elections.
About a couple of dozen workers of PPPP, PML-N and ANP staged a token protest outside Provincial Election Commission office.
No notable leader with the only exception of PPPP’s Aslam Gill bothered to participate in the scheduled event decided by the Opposition last week.
Secretary General MMA Liaquat Baloch made formal announcement of postponing scheduled event,stating contact could not be made with component parties of AFFE due to lack of time after protest outside ECP in Islamabad on Wednesday.
Addressing a Press conference at JI Lahore office on Thursday, he said that strategy would be evolved in next couple of days for holding mega protest outside Provincial Election Commission office.
Whether it was lack of coordination or indifferent attitude of PML-N and PPPP leaders that led to postponement of scheduled event is a big question.
The AFFE decided to hold protest outside ECP office in Islamabad on August 8 and outside provincial offices top poll body the following day.
Joint Oposition staged protests outside all provincial offices of Election Commission with the only exception in Lahore where less than two dozen workers of all Opposition parties reached the venue.
MMA did not bother to go to the Provincial Election Commission office and instead staged a demonstration outside JI Lahore office and that too with thin attendance.
Terming elections controversial and rigged, Liaqat Baloch demanded the resignation of the top officials of the Election Commission.
He also called for constituting a Parliamentary Commission and a Senate Committee to probe into the rigging allegations.
PPPP’s Haji Azizur Rehman Chann, JUI-F’s Maulana Amjad Khan and Riaz Durani, and JI’s Bilal Qudrat Butt, Amirul Azeem, Sarfraz Ahmed Khan and Maulana Javed Kasuri were also present.
Liaquat Baloch said that strong reservations on election results were pouring in from every nook and corner of the country.
He said that all the parties contesting the election were of the view that the results of the July 25th elections were not acceptable.
Baloch said that the Election Commission failed to function independently and it surrendered before some other authority.
Referring to display of Form 45 on ECP website, he said that elections had already become controversial and the explanation from the Election Commission was of no significance.
He said that if the new rulers ignored Opposition protest or adopted non-serious attitude, the government itself would be the loser.
He said that the party which came to power after the 2013 elections had ignored the Opposition protest and if Imran Khan committed the same mistake, the protest would grow strong.