Daily Times

Karachi: Caretaker Information Minister Jameel Yusuf, while condemning the Peshawar Bomb Blast incident, expressed his grief over the incident and sympathized with the family of Awami National Party (ANP) leader Haroon Bilour.

Haroon Bilour, the son of late Bashir Bilour, was among the twenty people martyred in a suicide attack, which took place in Peshawar on Tuesday night in the Yakatoot neighbourhood. The 47 year old ANP leader was rushed to the hospital in critical condition where he succumbed to his wounds. The deceased ANP leader was set to contest the July 25 elections from Peshawar’s PK-78 constituency.

While condoling with the bereaved family members, Jameel Yusuf said that their sacrifices will never be forgotten.

The Minister also reiterated the policy of the caretaker government to hold free and fair election on time through a statement issued on Wednesday. He has said that the Government was taking all possible steps to hold peaceful elections but anti state elements and terrorists were desperately trying to sabotage the law and order situation through their cowardly actions.

“The Government is committed to deal all such terrorists with an iron hand to fulfill its mandate to hold elections in time,” read the statement.

The Ministers appealed to all political parties and their leaderships to follow the code of conduct issued by ECP and cooperate with their respective local administrations to help organize their rallies and corner meeting with complete security. “The District administration with the workers of the political parties is discharging its national duty and keeping a vigil on such elements to ensure the holding of corner meetings, processions and other electoral activities without any untoward incident,” said Jameel Yusuf in his statement.

“Timely information of the parties electoral routes will help crush such anti-state elements and terrorists in carrying out their nefarious design and anti-state activities,” he added.

Visit to ‘Panah’ and ‘Darul Atfal’

Earlier on Wednesay, the Caretaker Minister for Information visited ‘Panah’ a shelter home for women who are victims of domestic and social injustices and ‘Darul Atfal’ a shelter home for children.

Social welfare advisor to caretaker chief minister (CM), Brig (retd) Haris Nawaz along with Secretary Social Welfare Secretary Taha Farooqui, Social Welfare Director General (DG) Ms. Sheema Arif, Information Director Ms. Zeenat Jahan, Social Welfare Additional Secretary Eesa Memon and other officers accompanied the Information minister on his visit.

Caretaker Advisor to CM, Haris Nawaz lauded the facilities, services and living environment provided to women seeking shelter in ‘Panah’ shelter home. Appreciating the shelter home, he said that other shelter providing organizations must seek guidance from Panah on how to provide welfare services to women in need.

During the visit, caretaker information minister Jameel Yousuf, who is also a founder trustee of ‘Panah’, informed the caretaker Advisor about rules and regulations of the trust and said that women from Sindh, Baluchistan and all over the country come to get shelter in ‘Panah’.

He informed him that courts and civil administration also sent shelter seeking women to ‘Panah’. He said that ‘Panah’ provided better accommodation, food, treatment, education, training and legal assistance to women in need.

Jameel Yousuf said that ‘panah’ strived to help and train helpless women so that they could become productive members of the society. Jameel Yusuf also appreciated the role of courts in providing timely justice to women seeking help. Haris Nawaz said that ‘panah’ was providing marvelous services to women.

After visiting ‘Panah’ both the caretaker minister and advisor, along with their delegation, visited ‘Darul-Atfal’ a children home in Shanti Nagar, Gulshan-e-Iqbal . They showed their dissatisfaction on deteriorating condition of facilities in the shelter home and issued directives for the betterment in provision of services. They gave biscuits, chips and other food items to the children living in the shelter home.

Published in Daily Times, July 12^th 2018.