LAHORE: Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan has urged the Supreme Court to charge the federal government with contempt for not implementing 18 major judgments and said the PML-N’s stronghold, Lahore, will turn into a PTI stronghold in the next general election.
He was addressing a press conference on the occasion of the launching of PTI’s “Jaag Utho” campaign — a virtual movement on Facebook (www.facebook.com/jaagutho) to motivate the youth against oppressive rule in Pakistan. The press conference was held at a local hotel in Gulberg here on Sunday.
“The present democracy is a mere eyewash. The government is itself damaging the cause of democracy by violating the verdicts of the Supreme Court,” Imran said. “But the people of Pakistan will stand by the Supreme Court which is struggling to implement rule of law without any discrimination. The PTI will lead the way and support the Supreme Court for the supremacy of law in the country,” he added.
Imran announced that the PTI would stage a sit-in in support of the SC on the Constitution Avenue every Saturday from Iftar to Sehr, beginning on August 6, 2011. “We will have Iftar together and offer our prayers on the road,” Imran said.
He said the country’s youth had decided to get rid of the corrupt system being patronised by corrupt leaders, who had different laws for the powerful and weak. “This is no longer a contest between right or left but a war between right and wrong,” Imran said. “The PTI won’t ever join hands with the political mafia or accept corrupt and opportunist politicians into the PTI’s fold in this war against the status quo. This political mafia is keeping its assets abroad in order to hide corruption and evade taxes,” he added.
To a question about the PML-N’s announcement that it would wage a war to ensure the implementation of SC verdicts, he said the PML-N should stop defrauding the people, and if it was serious about defending the Supreme Court, it should immediately resign and force the government to hold early elections in the country.
“We will never join hands with the PML-N, which had ditched the All Parties Democratic Alliance (APDM) over the issue of the Supreme Court,” he added. To a question regarding his party’s prospects in the next elections, Imran said the PTI would not just win but sweep the next general election. He also claimed that the PML-N’s stronghold Lahore would turn into a PTI stronghold in the election. “The PTI will beat Nawaz Sharif in Lahore even if he plays with his own umpires,” the cricketer-turned-politician using cricketing terms said.
To another question about the PTI’s stance on joining hands with a group of politicians led by Jehangir Tareen, he said the PTI would accept only clean politicians within its fold and said he would himself go to all clean politicians like Jehangir Tareen to ask them to join hands with the PTI to oust the corrupt regime, which has doubled Pakistan’s debt within three years in power.
In connection with the PTI’s “Jaag Utho” campaign, Imran said that the PTI would hold a virtual rally on Facebook on August 14, bringing the youth together on a single platform to raise their voice against the corrupt system in the country. “This virtual rally will then lead to a physical rally on the streets of Pakistan,” he said, adding that the PTI had also launched an SMS campaign (80022) against the corrupt system and to get support in favour of a truly democratic and just system in the country.
Earlier, PTI Punjab President Ahsan Rasheed, Secretary General Dr Yasmin Raashid, Central Information Secretary Umer Cheema, and Punjab’s Information Secretary Andaleeb Abbas also spoke.