Manan Mandokhail:
QUETTA: The Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party (PKMAP) staged a protest demonstration against the alleged police raid at the residence of Mehmood Khan Achakzai on Monday evening. The party claimed police conducted what it called an ‘illegal raid’ at the residence of Mehmood Achakzai, the Pakistan Tehrik e Insaf (PTI) backed presidential candidate.
The charge was vehemently denied by the deputy commissioner Quetta, Saad Asad. Mr. Asad said the raid was routine work by the district administration and revenue department to reclaim a piece of land.
The PKMAP supporters on various roads of the city and chanted full-throated slogans against the district administration, police and provincial government. “This all happened because of a speech by the party chairman for supremacy of parliament”, Rauf Lala, one of the central leaders of the party claimed.
Mr. Asad, the deputy commissioner of Quetta alleged that the reclaimed land, having an area of 2.5 kanals and encircled with a boundary wall, was illegally occupied by the PkMAP chief.
The party will not make any compromise over the supremacy of parliament and constitution, Mr. Lala said. He said the party chairman has always stood by the rule of law and the supremacy of the constitution in the country.
The former caretaker Balochistan information minister, Jan Achakzai also defended the raid and said that it was nothing personal against the PKMAP chief. “It was part of a crackdown against land grabbers”, Mr. Achakzai said.
The party leaders in their speeches lashed out at the provincial government and accused it of punishing the party chief for what it called his democratic stance in the country. “We will not abandon our democratic struggle”, Abdul Rahim Ziaratwal, another central leader of the party said. Mr. Ziaratwal said that all-out efforts would be made to ensure the protection of democratic and human rights in the country.
