#Pakistan - PPP’s Rabbani ‘charge-sheets’ President Alvi, levels six allegations against him

PPP senior leader and Senator Raza Rabbani has demanded of President Dr Arif Alvi to resign from the post of Head of the State accusing him of not letting go of his affiliation with a political party which installed him to the office, on Saturday.

While asking the President to step down, Rabbani levelled six allegations against him saying he failed to renounce his political affiliation despite being the Supreme Commander of Armed Forces as has been enshrined in Article 243/2 IC. Unfortunately, his political affiliation has obstructed him to perform his duties as the Supreme Commander.

It’s a pity that President Alvi has failed to perform his duties, the senator added.

The PPP leader further alleged that Dr Alvi could not attain any maturity while holding the office of President because of the fact that he has primarily remained the PTI worker.

He said this was not for the first time that the President Alvi has failed to perform his duties due to his political affiliation.

President Alvi has been embroiled in a controversy as why he didn’t attend the funeral prayers of the martyrs who lost their lives in the military helicopter crash in Balochistan on Aug 1.In a series of tweets last night, he tried to explain his position. The ISPR too denounced on Friday the ‘regretful social media campaign’ after the recent helicopter crash in which six army officials, including a lieutenant general, embraced martyrdom.President Alvi tweeted: “There is unnecessary controversy on why I did not attend Janaza of the Shaheeds recently. This gives me an opportunity to condemn in unequivocal terms the despicable tweets by those who are neither aware of our culture or our religion. When respect for Shahadat is also present in the Quran, how can we desecrate the memory & the sacrifice of those whom Allah has given eternal life. Like all Pakistanis I have admired the Shuhuda all my life.Rabbani further alleged that being President, he tried to throw spanners in the work of Parliament as a legislative body using Article 89.

President Alvi deprived the Parliament of its right to legislate through the reissuance of the PMDC Ordinance.

The PPP senator accused the President of acting against the law while appointing heads of different institutes. These appointments were later cancelled by the courts.He alleged that the President sent a bogus reference against the judges of the superior judiciary on the wrong advice under Article 209 of the Constitution.The president issued notification of the NFC representative from Balochistan which was later declared null and void.

Rabbani also alleged that President Alvi issued the direction to dissolve the National Assembly on the advice of a ‘disqualified prime minister’.

https://thefrontierpost.com/ppps-rabbani-charge-sheets-president-alvi-levels-six-allegations-against-him/

Video Report - "حکومت عمران خان کیخلاف ریفرنس دائر کرنی جارہی ہے، قانون کے مطابق پارٹی کو بین کیا جائے گا"

#Pakistan - FIA Constitutes 5-Member Team to Probe PTI’s Prohibited Funding

Monitoring team will supervise inquiries across Pakistan, including Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Friday formally launched a nationwide inquiry into the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)’s utilization of “prohibited” funds in light of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP)’s ruling that the party secured illegal donations.

A five-member monitoring team, headed by Muhammad Athar Waheed, has been constituted to supervise inquiries across Pakistan, including Islamabad, Karachi, Peshawar, Lahore and Quetta. It said that the inquiry had been launched as the result of a letter written by PTI founding member Akbar S. Babar, who had requested a probe against the PTI for receiving funds through accounts opened in the name of subordinate employees.In his letter, Babar said the PTI’s financial board in 2011 had illegally authorized four subordinate employees—Tahir Iqbal, Muhammad Nauman Afzal, Muhammad Arshad, Muhammad Rafiq—of the party’s central secretariat to collect donations in their personal accounts from within Pakistan and abroad. He said Rs. 11.104 million had been deposited in their accounts, which was beyond their known sources of income.

The FIA’s probe also covers the utilization of funds in 13 undeclared accounts, with the agency issuing notices to the account holders. In their preliminary interviews, the PTI employees said they did not know accounts had been opened in their names. In his statement, Muhammad Arshad said he had no knowledge of who was sending the funding and from where. Similarly, Muhammad Rafiq said the PTI’s finance department just used to take blank checks signed by him.

All four employees have already challenged the FIA notices in the Islamabad High Court, urging for the notices to be dismissed and the FIA barred from acting against the petitioners.

https://www.newsweekpakistan.com/fia-constitutes-5-member-team-to-probe-ptis-prohibited-funding/

Pakistan: Punjab government radicalizing society against minorities

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has strongly opposed the Punjab government’s move to incorporate a mandatory declaration of belief in the finality of Prophethood in ‘nikahnama’ forms.“Such a provision panders to the right wing and could be used to incite violence against religious minorities if misused”, said HRCP in the statement.

The newly elected leader, Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi and his government in the Punjab province of Pakistan on Saturday approved an amendment to the Punjab Muslim Family Rules under the Muslim Family Law Ordinance 1961, making signing a declaration on the belief in the finality of prophethood (PBUH) mandatory for Muslim couples intending to get married.

In a notification issued by the provincial government, all the secretaries of union councils have been directed to provide the amended nikahnama containing the declaration of certainty of prophethood (PBUH) to all nikah registrars immediately, failing which they will be liable to face strict disciplinary action.

HRCP said in the statement, “Such a declaration is already mandatory when acquiring identity documents and should not be necessary at this stage”.

“The practical purpose of a nikah nama is to establish that both parties are contracting a marriage freely and to protect women’s right to divorce. It is not to establish an individual’s religious beliefs, which are a private matter and protected by Article 20 of the constitution,” it added.

https://theprint.in/world/pakistan-punjab-government-radicalizing-society-against-minorities/1067690/

#Pakistan - The systematic persecution of minorities for political mileage

 Raza Habib Raja

We are now making it impossible for Ahmadis, who are as much as Pakistanis as all of us, to live in this country.

A few days ago, I wrote a blog on a shameful incident in Faisalabad involving the arrest of three Ahmadi individuals for practicing the Islamic ritual of animal sacrifice, otherwise known as "Qurbani" in Urdu. The incident shocked me for two reasons. First was the sheer inhumanity of arresting someone for an act which is performed by millions in Pakistan. Second, because the said individuals were performing the ritual within the confinement of their own homes, which means technically, they were not violating Section 298-C of the Pakistan Penal Code, which prohibits any person of the Ahmadi sect from calling himself a Muslim or preaching or propagating his faith. Notwithstanding the draconian nature of the said law, the arrested Ahmadis were not violating it any ways.

Condemning the incident, I wrote,

“From policing their behavior in public, we have now started to breach the privacy of their homes and in doing so are forcefully stripping them of their human dignity and respect completely.”

At that point, I thought we had reached the lowest possible level of our moral bankruptcy. Little did I know that when it comes to Ahmadis, both our state and the society have an amazing capacity to constantly outdo all our previous misdeeds.

Since then, two similar incidents have come to surface, which again have left me completely stunned. First, the government of Chaudary Pervaiz Elahi, immediately after taking over Punjab, decided to amend the nikkah nama form by including the clause about belief in finality of Prophethood. Second, in another and even more troubling development, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) leader Malik Ilyas Awan submitted a letter to the deputy commissioner of Khushab, requesting him to take away security from the Ahmadi residents of the region, while also calling for their eviction from Khushab.

While the Eid incident demonstrated bigotry and hatred at the general population level, what makes these two latest developments particularly shocking is involvement of the government. When such steps are taken by the government, then it means that it has abandoned its basic responsibility of provision of safety and protection to all its citizens and has become completely partisan against a minority and in the process increasingly showing traits of a quasi-fascist state. The updating of nikkah nama is the continuation of the long trend of including such clauses in various government documents. This step was not needed as such since this requirement is already present in many identification documents. Moreover, the Muslim Family Law is not a provincial subject and yet the Punjab government decided to take this step. In my opinion, it does not serve any purpose except to further promote and institutionalise discrimination against Ahmadis for the purpose of extracting political mileage. This was first proposed in March 2022, before the no-confidence motion and even at that time there was criticism from the liberal quarters that the sole purpose of this was nothing but petty political gains.

Now, after “retaking” Punjab, the PTI and PML-Q coalition immediately enacted the bill they had proposed in March. One reason as to why they have done so is that in recent by-elections, which they won convincingly, they played on a religious wicket in order to outflank the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP). They were so effective in their campaign of whipping up religion, including the finality of Prophethood issue, that TLP witnessed its share plung to merely 5%. Since the issue of finality of Prophethood is intrinsically linked with Ahmadis, therefore, whenever it is raised for the sake of extracting political mileage, they end up getting victimised.

Since the coalition had already charged up its base by using this tactic, it has now tried to demonstrate that those had not been just “empty slogans” after taking over. In other words, the coalition has tried to prove its “commitment” to the issue. Due to recent sloganeering, the issue has gained strength and as a result, the second development, – i.e. request from PLM-Q to expel Ahmadis and removal of their security – can also be understood in the same context. It is a continuation of the trend in which religion, particularly the issue of finality of Prophethood, is raised, followed by some measure against the already marginalised Ahmadi community.

As I mentioned in my old blog, although all minorities in Pakistan suffer from discrimination, the treatment meted out to Ahmadis is by far the worst. There is what I call "Ahmadi exceptionalism" in Pakistan. And the way things are going, I really don’t see an end to this pattern. I genuinely fear that the tactics used by PTI will now be adopted by other parties such as Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and TLP with even greater vigor in the future.

Two years ago, in a piece about the politicisation of the Ahmadi issue, I wrote:

“Academic Sadia Saeed has identified three state responses, each one harsher than the previous, over the Ahmadi issue. First was accommodation, when in 1953 the state curbed anti-Ahmadi agitation; second was exclusion, when the state declared them non-Muslims in 1974; and the third was criminalisation under the Ziaul Haq regime, where anti-Ahmadi ordinances were introduced. The way we are regressing, I am afraid that a fourth one is not far away: ethnic cleansing or forced displacement of Ahmadis from Pakistan.”

I think with these recent developments, the fourth stage has started. We are now creating circumstances where it is impossible for Ahmadis, who are as much as Pakistanis as all of us, to live in this country. In doing so, we are depriving them of even basic human dignity and right to live while we are ourselves are morphing into a bigoted, hate-filled and cruel society.

https://tribune.com.pk/article/the-systematic-persecution-of-minorities-for-political-mileage-1