The Provincial Assembly of Sindh on Thursday passed a resolution demanding that stern punishment be handed down to the planners, facilitators and perpetrators of last year’s May 9 violence in the country.
The House adopted the resolution on the first anniversary of the May 9 riots. The resolution was moved by the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party’s MPA Sadia Javed. The resolution termed the May 9 incident a grave conspiracy against Pakistan.
The concerned legislators who spoke on the resolution said that Pakistan’s solidarity and security were most dear to them. They said that no concession should be granted to those who made a mockery of the daring men who had laid down their lives to guard their country, and to those who were involved in damaging national monuments.
The opposition lawmakers backed by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), however, chose to resort to sloganeering during the proceedings of the House, and walked out of the PA. Speaking on the resolution, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said that the sorrowful incident that happened last year on May 9 was part of a premeditated conspiracy.
Shah mentioned that anti-state elements had started conspiring against Pakistan soon after a separate homeland for Muslims of the Indian subcontinent had come into being. He said that poisonous propaganda was inculcated into the minds of the youth in the country to act upon a grave conspiracy against the integrity of the country. Without naming PTI founder Imran Khan, the CM said he (Khan) had not spared any opportunity to taint the reputation of the country.
He recalled that the PPP leadership stood for integrity and solidarity of the country, and when former prime minister Benazir Bhutto had been martyred on December 27, 2007, it was the darkest day in the country’s history.
He also recalled that PPP founder Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had been judicially murdered, pointing out that the apex judiciary had recently accepted its failure in serving justice to the late party founder.
Shah said the Pakistani nation had stood completely united and foiled the grave conspiracy against the country that had unfolded on May 9 last year. He said the planners of the May 9 mayhem should be handed down punishment because they are still using social media to spread their propaganda to misguide the Pakistani youth.
The CM said they belong to the fraternity of democracy lovers, so they can never lend support to any traitor. He said that anti-state elements deserve no concession, as there should not be any soft corner for the people conspiring against Pakistan.
PA opposition leader Ali Khursheedi of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan lent his support to the resolution, saying that Pakistan being the motherland should be the only inviolable red line for the people of the country.
Khursheedi said peace cannot be restored in the country until the planners of the May 9 violence are handed down stern punishment. He said that certain misguided people are following a fascist leader. The PTI’s propaganda has spread like cancer in the country over the past decade, he added.
PPP MPA Faryal Talpur said that the May 9 riots were a highly condemnable incident in the country’s history. She said that the elements that instigated violence in the country should be given stern punishment. The legislator pointed out that the PTI is not a political party, rather it is a bunch of people bent upon spreading anarchy in the country.
Sindh Local Government Minister Saeed Ghani said the PTI founder had always considered himself above the law. Ghani said that special protocol had been extended to the PTI’s founder upon his appearance in court.