PTI general-secretary Asad Umar on Tuesday said to the PML-N-led coalition government that its crackdown on the party’s leadership would not help run the country, but would instead bring it to a halt.
“I want to the tell you that what happened last night has just increased the enthusiasm and passion among our workers,” Umar said at a news conference in Peshawar alongside the party’s vice chairman Shah Mahmood Qureshi today, in the aftermath of police raids on the residences of several key PTI figures.
“You can use power to bring Pakistan to a halt, not run it,” Umar said and strongly condemned the “harassment and arrests” of PTI’s leaders in Punjab.
According to former information minister Fawad Chaudhry, “nearly 1,100 houses were raided and over 400 women and men were arrested overnight”. A police officer was martyred during the chaos on Monday night.
Meanwhile, videos of the police action, that are doing rounds on social media, drew widespread condemnation from politicians, journalists and other quarters.
The PTI leader revealed that the raids were not limited to Lahore, alleging that lawmakers were arrested in Sindh, Islamabad and Rawalpindi as well. “In Punjab, a 75-year-old woman was taken into custody. The police even tried to take our MPA Yasmin Rashid, who is recovering from cancer.”
What was the government trying to do, Umar asked, cautioning that such incidents would just further push the country into chaos.
