Daily Times

Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) President and former prime minister Ch Shujaat Hussain has said military courts are still needed by the nation and that nobody should play politics on the issue.

Talking to reporters on Sunday, Shujaat said it is not understandable that what those people who are opposing extension to military courts are afraid of. He said the entire civilian and military leadership had supported the approval of National Action Plan (NAP). “In the last four years, the NAP points related to armed forces of Pakistan have been executed but regretfully the civilian institutions have not completed the work assigned to them under the plan,” he said.

“In the founding meeting of the National Action Plan, I was present, and so were the heads of all political parties. In the meeting, when military courts matter came up, I had said that ask a mother who had sent her son in uniform with lunch box to the Army Public School but she got his child’s body in pieces. That mother won’t listen to sermons on constitution and law,” Shujaat said.

“After the APS tragedy, at a meeting of heads of all political parties, Nawaz Sharif, Asif Zardari, incumbent Prime Minister Imran Khan, Asfand Yar Wali, Aftab Sherpao, myself, other party chiefs as well as then chief of army staff General Raheel Sharif were present. All had unanimously supported the National Action Plan, and afterwards Maulana Fazlur Rehman had led the prayers for its success,” the PML-Q chief said. “Those who had signed NAP should not indulge in any criticism now and should not back out of it,” he added.

Published in Daily Times, January 21^st 2019.