An emergency meeting of PAT Central Working Council was held here in the central secretariat of the party to discuss the brewing Yemen crisis. The meeting expressed its grave concern on the situation and said that irresponsible statements given by the government have endangered the lives of Pakistanis living there. It further demanded of the government to inform the nation about the exact number of the Pakistani expatriate community living in Yemen. The participants of the meeting also expressed their serious concern on the news regarding shutting down of Pakistani Embassy, saying that the Embassy should have remained open till evacuation of all Pakistanis. They also expressed their concern on the suspect LNG agreement and said that if the government is not involved in any kind of corruption, or kickback, it should immediately make the documents of deal public. The meeting prayed for early recovery and long life of PAT chief Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri.

The meeting was presided over by Supreme Council Chairman Dr Hassan Mohi-ud-Din Qadri, whereas Faiz-ur-Rehman Durrani, Brig. (r) Iqbal Ahmad, Mian Sajid Pervez, Chaudhry Mazhar, GM Malik, Allama Farhat Hussain Shah, Sheikh Zahid Fayyaz, Rana Idrees, Mian Zahid, Jawad Hamid, Razia Naveed, Sajid Bhatti, Noorullah Saddiqi, Shoaib Tahir, Irfan Yousaf and others were also present on the occasion.

The meeting strongly condemned the Chief Minister Punjab for not constituting a neutral JIT for investigation into Model Town tragedy and it was resolved that peaceful struggle will continue till the culprits involved in Model Town incident are brought to justice. The participants of the meeting also evolved a strategy about participation in LG polls in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It was decided to go for seat adjustment with the like-minded parties in KPK. They also welcomed the Lahore High Court’s decision regarding holding of LG polls in Punjab along party lines and said that party-based elections should be held in the cantonment areas of the country.

The meeting further described the amendment by the government to hold LG polls on non-party basis in the federal capital as reflective of ill will on the part of the government. It said that the Punjab government’s act of distributing jobs and millions of rupees in the name of development funds among the provincial assembly members as pre-poll rigging. It asked the Election Commission to take notice of this situation.

A resolution adopted on the occasion asked the Punjab government to purge the wheat procurement process of politics by making it transparent, further saying that the government should announce to buy every grain of wheat from the farmers having less than 12.5 acres of land. The meeting also condemned the government for baton-charging and arrests of farmers during their peaceful demonstration in Lahore. The participants, through a resolution, rubbished registration of a case against Sahibzada Hamid Raza and other religious scholars who raised effective voice against terrorism. They asked the ruling party to de-link implementation on the National Action Plan from politicking. They also expressed their grave concern on the increasing load-shedding in the country. Dr Hassan Mohi-ud-Din Qadri said that the government’s claims of less load-shedding during the months of June and July will be exposed in due course of time.