Shaukat Yousafzai Demands Party Leadership Postpone Long March, Warns of Potential Emergency and Confrontation
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) presidential candidate, Shaukat Yousafzai, has officially requested the party leadership to suspend the next long march urging them to go with the flow of the current political crisis instead of head-on confrontation.
Yousafzai in an official letter, which was forwarded to PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and top party leaders, voiced grave concern about the possible use of the scheduled protest as an excuse to declare an emergency in KP.
The key concerns included in the letter are highlighted:
Possibility of Provincial Government Dismissal: Yousafzai said the federal government could use the current security troubles—may be from Afghanistan border—to dissolve the provincial government.
Call for a Cool-Headed Strategy: The PTI leader pointed out that direct confrontation may cause serious harm to the party, the provincial government and the party workers. He emphasized the need for the party to develop a sensible plan in the nation’s best interests.
Emphasizing dialogues, Yousafzai stressed that the party’s fundamental demands could not be compromised, but it was important to promote negotiations which would help ease tensions and move the nation out of the current deadlock. He also remembered occasions when PTI founder Imran Khan earlier cancelled protest to look after the workers’ safety.