Maulana tells workers to continue long march preps despite PDM falling out

Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman has directed the party’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) chapter to continue preparations for the March 26 long march to Islamabad, reports said Thursday.

A letter was written to the party’s KP leadership on Fazl’s directives, directing the leaders not to slow down the preparations. The letter said the long march has only been postponed until Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) makes its decision on the march.

Nine of the 11 component parties of the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) are ready to participate in the long march while PPP has sought time to make a final decision concerning en masse resignations, the letter said.

The development comes two days after the opposition alliance announced to postpone the long march after PPP linked its resignations from the legislative assemblies with deposed prime minister and Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) supreme leader Nawaz Sharif’s return — a condition PML-N termed out of the question.

“Nine parties [of PDM] were in favour of resignations along with the long march but PPP had expressed some reservations,” Fazl told reporters on Tuesday, adding the PPP would discuss the matter during its upcoming central executive committee (CEC) meeting.

A day earlier, Fazl held a telephonic conversation with Nawaz and urged him to return to Pakistan, saying with top PML-N leadership living abroad in self-exile, it was difficult to execute decisions taken by the opposition alliance.

After spending a year in prison, Nawaz, 71, secured a conditional bail in November 2019 to travel to London on the pretext of medical treatment and has since refused to return.

His party insists that despite being summoned by the courts, which declared him a proclaimed offender in multiple corruption trials, the former premier will only return after the completion of his medical treatment.