Peshawar traders suffer huge losses during protests

Despite being first in announcing solidarity with the protesters on Yaum-e-Ishq-e-Rasool (PBUH) on Friday, the traders suffered losses amounting to millions of rupees as their business centres were attacked and damaged in parts of the city. At least in one mobile phones market in Peshawar Saddar, the mob damaged the shutters, smashed the showcases of shops and got away with the mobile phone sets. The traders and businessmen suffered the first loss when a group of protesters reached the Hashtnagri Chowk in the afternoon and attacked the main office of the Khyber Pakhuntunkhwa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KPCCI) on the Grand Trunk (GT) Road. The KPCCI office, known as Chamber House, is adjacent to the Chacha Yunas Park, where the protesters turned every swing and play-game machines upside down.The Chamber House is the headquarters of the prime body of the traders and businessmen of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The angry mob smashed the façade panes and the front board of the Chamber House before setting fire to a private bank sited on the ground floor of the building. The protesters also burnt four cars belonging to the bank officials and employees of the Bilour Industries office parked in the courtyard of the Chamber House. The Bilour family belonging to the ruling ANP own the Bilour Industries. President KPCCI Afan Aziz, during his visit to the Chamber House in the evening told The News that the traders were part of the protest as upholding the reverence and respect of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and condemning any blasphemous act were the first and foremost duty of every Muslim. “We had fixed banners on Chamber House condemning the sacrilegious film produced in the US,” he reminded. He said the chamber condemned the so-called freedom of expression of the Americans which they used as pretext to carry out many sacrilegious acts. He deplored that the protesters even burnt the banners that condemned the profane movie. Afan Aziz said the way the protesters gave vent to their rage against the sacrilegious film was not appropriate. “It is not the way to put across the message. The protesters should have sent their message to the world the way our Holy Prophet (PBUH) would do,” he maintained. He said there were peaceful ways to record condemnation and protest against the film. About the losses to the Chamber House, he said it was difficult to asses it at the moment but it would not be less than a million rupees. He said the most shocking thing the protesters did was ransacking of the mosque at the back of the chamber building and taking away ceiling fans from there, he added. “They also rummaged around the new Research and Development block and looted some 20 computers and other equipment from different sections,” he added. To a question as to why the mob attacked the chamber building, he said, “they might have mistaken it for a government building.” Proceeding further on the GT Road, the protesters after setting ablaze the Shabistan, Shama and Naz cinema houses also broke shutters of various shops and looted various items from shops and roadside shacks on the Pajjagi Road and the Jinnah Park area. The traders on the University Road and in Saddar suffered huge losses. President Markazi Tanzeem Tajran, Sharafat Ali Mubarak said they held peaceful protest after the Juma prayers to condemn the profane film, but some protestors attacked and looted their businesses in Saddar. He said the protesters went on a rampage in the Muslim Market and smashed the showcases of cellphone shops and looted hundreds of mobile phones sets.