By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf has rejected calls from within its own ranks to delay a march on Islamabad for a second time, with the chief minister of its stronghold province vowing that supporters will set out on 4 October whatever the consequences.
Sohail Afridi, who leads the PTI government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, told a press conference in Peshawar on Tuesday that the march would go ahead despite speculation that governor’s rule or an emergency could be imposed in the province, with supporters gathering first in Swabi before moving on. He said workers had been given instructions and a chain of command would be set up, with designated leaders responsible for groups of supporters and deputies ready to step in if one went missing.
The defiant message came hours after a senior party figure urged the leadership to think again. Shaukat Yousafzai, PTI’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa information secretary, wrote to party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and other leaders asking them to postpone the march further in the “wider national interest”, citing the security situation and a rise in militant violence.
Yousafzai warned that the federal government could seize on certain issues as a pretext to impose emergency rule, and that a possible attack from Afghanistan could be used to justify it. He said Islamabad was building a narrative that the provincial government was not cooperating, which could lead to attempts to dissolve it, or to accusations that the party backed terrorism and, ultimately, a ban on PTI.
He pointed to Imran Khan’s own decision to call off an earlier long march to protect workers’ lives, and called for dialogue with the state rather than confrontation.
CM Afridi was unmoved. He told reporters he had not received the letter, and said that had it reached him he would have thrown it away. According to party sources, he also questioned why workers were being discouraged and told colleagues that no message of disappointment should be passed to supporters.
The chief minister had earlier chaired a meeting of PTI’s parliamentary party at his residence in Peshawar, where some lawmakers joined by Zoom rather than attending in person. Party sources said Afridi expressed displeasure at what he saw as a lack of commitment to preparations for the march.
“We also have Mir Jafars and Mir Sadiqs within our ranks,” he told the meeting, invoking two historical figures whose names have become shorthand for treachery in South Asian politics.
He repeated that the party would leave Peshawar on 4 October. “We are not going to conquer Islamabad, and the federal government is blocking our way,” he said. Responding to allegations that protesters might carry sticks or slingshots, he said: “We will go with two hands and two feet.” He later posted on X: “You should prepare; I am ready.”
Reports of the meeting said participants discussed reaching Swabi on 4 October and staying for several days, possibly in a tent city, with decisions on whether and when to advance on Islamabad to be taken there. Supporters are also expected to mark Khan’s birthday in Swabi on 5 October.
Junaid Akbar, PTI’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa president, told lawmakers and leaders abroad to return home. Anyone not in Pakistan on 4 October, he said, would have no connection with the party and could form another one if they wished.
Gohar rejected Yousafzai’s plea and reaffirmed the march. He said the party had no plans to dissolve the provincial assembly and that Afridi could not be disqualified “under any circumstances”. Reports that PTI had consulted on finding an alternative chief minister were fabricated, he said, adding that Afridi enjoyed the full confidence of Khan and would stay in post.
Ali Zafar, a PTI senator, said the delay to 4 October had given the government a chance to negotiate, and that talks could begin if it took “one step”. A meeting between the opposition leader and the government before 27 September could not be called negotiations, he said; proper talks should be held between committees behind closed doors. The 4 October date, he said, was final, and the government was afraid of the march.
The government says it has not shut the door on talks. Azam Nazeer Tarar, the law minister, said the objection was to PTI making Khan’s release a precondition for dialogue.
“We have repeatedly said that the forum for this is the courts, not the government,” he said. “Their appeal is pending, so they should pursue it.”
He asked whether such a process could be carried out “through rallies and protests, by marching on cities and using force”, and answered that it would be unconstitutional. The government’s first duty, he said, was to protect lives and property.
On the Supreme Court’s order over Mr Khan’s transfer to a private hospital, Tarar said the court had ordered a medical examination, which had been carried out, and that any shortcomings in implementation were for the court to examine, not for street protests to resolve.
Afridi had offered talks over the weekend. He asked why negotiations should wait until after the march if they could be held before it.
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