Daily Times

 Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan said Wednesday that “darkness lies ahead” for the nation if it does not stand up after his party’s senior leader, Fawad Chaudhry, was arrested in a sedition case.

In a televised press conference, the PTI chairman addressed the judges of the apex court, saying that they had been entrusted with upholding rule of law. “The kinds of verdicts being given and how the Constitution and laws are being torn apart, there is no future for such a country.” he called on the country’s judiciary to protect the party’s fundamental rights. He also questioned what Fawad’s crime was.

“It is a crime to call the election commissioner a munshi (clerk)?” he asked, referring to Fawad’s press talk on Tuesday. Imran asserted that the ECP was responsible for holding free and fair elections in the country, reiterating his criticism of the commission’s decision to appoint media mogul Mohsin Naqvi the caretaker chief minister of Punjab. “On what basis did you choose Mohsin Naqvi as the caretaker chief minister?” he said. “Was there no one else that you picked the person who was against us the most?” Imran said that he expected the judiciary to “protect our fundamental rights”. “The nation is expecting you to protect our rights.”

Imran claimed that Naqvi had reinstated all the officials who were part of the cabinet of Hamza Shahbaz. “Does this fall under preparing for free and fair elections. Is this a neutral umpire?” He claimed that police had already started to harass PTI workers, adding that whatever was happening was being carried out “according to a plan”. “They are here to do what Zardari did in Karachi. This is what is done when they don’t have a vote bank but win the elections.” Imran made it clear that he would continue challenging the people behind his ouster. “If someone thinks that I will accept their slavery, I want to clarify that I will challenge them till my last breath.”He also alleged that the Naqvi and the PML-N were reconstituting the JIT (joint investigation team) probing the assassination attempt against him in Wazirabad. “I can only hope for justice if the JIT is formed under the supervision of the chief justice himself.”

The PTI chairman also spoke about approaching the judiciary against the Punjab caretaker chief executive. “I appeal the judiciary to protect our basic right. The nation is expecting the judiciary to safeguard their rights and save democracy,” he said, further lamenting how the institution hasn’t done that so far. Hinting that “powerful” forces were out to get him and were involved in his attack, Khan said: “DPO Gujrat Ghazanfar Hussain and SSP Nadeem Hussain, made a video of Naveed, but when the JIT called the two officers and asked for the mobile phone [used to make the recording], they flatly refused. I want to know who was behind these two officers?” The PTI chief went on to say that he could only hope for any justice in the matter if the JIT has been formed under the supervision of the chief justice himself. However, he said: “I have no hope for justice if those who I believed were involved in the attack – Rana Sanaullah and Shehbaz Sharif -are sitting in the federal government.”