Maulana taken into confidence Mahmood Khan Achakzai and Akhtar Mengal in this connection
Abdul Hakeem Mohmand
PESHAWAR
After being disillusioned with the country’s main opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) parties, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the chief of Jamait-i-Ulema-i-Islam (F), geared up efforts to win support of smaller parties ahead of launching an anti-government movement.
According to JUI-F sources, the Maulana met Qaumi Watan Party (QWP)’s chief Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao and Mian Iftikhar Hussain, General Secretary of Awami National Party (ANP) on Monday and convinced both the leaders to start an aggressive campaign and opposition against the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government.
Sources further said that the Maulana has already taken into confidence Mahmood Khan Achakzai of Pakhtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party and Akhtar Mengal of Baluchistan National Party in this connection. Sources revealed that a joint consultative meeting of the smaller parties will be held in the current week in this regard.
The JUI-F led consultative meeting would address the concerns of all parties and would evolve a strategy for the movement to be effective. Following the consultative meeting, they will also approach PML-N and PPP and would put before them their agenda.
For this purpose, sources said, the smaller political parties during a joint meeting would constitute a decision-making committee to set the tone for giving a tough time to the incumbent government.
The PML-N and PPP know that the seasoned Maulana has grievances against their top leadership after he was ditched through a marginalised and symbolic support that was shown to him at his last year’s ‘Azadi March’.
A day earlier, the PML-N supremo and former three-time prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, had said that he has directed his party not to disappoint the Maulana this time.
Confirming his chief’s meetings with leaders of smaller parties, the JUI-F spokesperson Abdul Jalil Jan said that the government has lost the trust of the masses. “The JUI-F will get the people out of the current political and financial quagmire by compelling the sitting rulers to step down,” he added.
