By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD Former prime minister Imran Khan on Wednesday announced to launch an anti-government protest movement from Saturday to press his demand for fresh elections.
“I am going to start a movement against the government from Saturday (September 24) and you (lawyers) have to stand up for law and be part of this to achieve ‘Haqiqi Azadi’,” Khan said at a lawyers’ convention outside the Lahore registry of the Supreme Court.
Khan also said he would soon give a call for a long march on Islamabad to send the ‘imported government’ home.
An opposition-led alliance ousted the cricketer-turned-politician from office in April in a parliamentary vote of no-confidence, ending his nearly four-year-old government. Khan’s staunch political rival, Shehbaz Sharif, replaced him as the head of a new ruling coalition.
Since his ouster, Khan wants the new prime minister, Sharif, to call early parliamentary elections to determine which one of them is more popular in Pakistan.
Last May, Khan led an anti-government march to Islamabad and gathered thousands of supporters in front of the parliament building. Most of his followers and workers arrived in the federal capital from Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces.
The former prime minister called off his protest after clashes between police and demonstrators which led to the arrest of hundreds of his supporters.
Following Khan’s announcement, the government has called for additional police force from provinces to stop his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party’s possible march towards Islamabad.
Containers have been placed on the roads leading towards the Red Zone. Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah said if Khan dared to come to the D-Chowk, then the government would deal him with ‘an iron hand’.
Political tensions have increased in the country at a time when the Sharif government is struggling to deal with a deepening economic crisis, which stems from rising inflation.
Khan said both the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have predicted a “Sri Lanka-like turmoil for Pakistan”.
“The PML-N led government is turning Pakistan into Sri Lanka as the country (Pakistan) is moving towards big social unrest which had not been seen in the past 50 years.”
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