MNA Sheraz abducted from Multan house by masked men: Gohar

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leadership slammed the ‘abduction’ of party MNA Khawaja Sheraz Mehmood on Wednesday and said it was high time to take to the streets to rein in the reign of terror, unleashed on the party, its lawmakers and supporters.

Speaking at a news conference, flanked by PTI Secretary General Barrister Salman Akram Raja, PTI Information Secretary Sheikh Waqas Akram and MNA Faisal Amin, PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan explained that their news conference was specifically aimed at highlighting the abduction of Khawaja Sheraz.

He explained the MNA’s house was raided on Tuesday night by unknown masked men in the same old fashion. They broke open doors of the house, harassed children and other family members and took the MNA away to an undisclosed location. The PTI chairman said they knew nothing about his whereabouts so far but some of his family members believed that he was taken to Islamabad to the ‘big house’, which was deplorable.

He recalled that it was not a solitary incident, as recently Imran Khan’s focal person and senior lawyer Intezar Panjhuta was also abducted and left at a roadside in deplorable condition.

Gohar said that Sheraz was abducted due to his unwavering stance on constitutional amendments, as after his prolonged stay in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, he had endured targeted harassment. He continued that initially, his Taunsa Sharif residence was vandalised, and last night masked individuals forcibly entered his Multan home to abduct him.

He regretted that “fascism and lawlessness was rampant” and the PTI was its main target in Punjab in which the provincial government and its police were equally involved. Barrister Gohar said they strongly condemned the fascism and protested against these brutalities, demanding the National Assembly speaker to take notice of the tragic and unfortunate incident as Sheraz was not only an elected member of the National Assembly but also the chairman of a House standing committee.

The PTI chairman urged the chief justice of Pakistan to take immediate notice of the matter. He pointed out that the Supreme Court had ruled that no individual should be taken away from their home without a warrant unless named in an FIR. “I brought this issue to the prime minister’s notice, but our MNAs are still being arrested,” he added, recalling that a committee was formed to protect parliamentarians after the abduction of PTI MPs from the Parliament House, but no positive outcome was seen so far.

Salman Akram Raja, addressing the presser, pointed out that the “world was looking at us in horror and asking questions if Pakistan had become a lawless state, where only abduction was the law of the land, which was being used as a tool to coerce and to ‘force’ support of vote in the NA and the Senate”. He said, “Everything else seems to be irrelevant, as our legal system and our courts have become helpless. The world is now wondering as to where Pakistan is headed and what happened to our MNA is yet another step in that dark night”. Salman Raja made it clear that the world would not sit quiet and they would also not sit silently and protest at every avenue available to them including parliament, courts and streets.

He said that what happened to Sheraz was horrifying, which was now happening on daily basis, especially in Punjab.

Sheikh Waqas gave ‘disturbing details’ about the treatment meted out to Khawaja Sheraz and his family and said his house was raided by unknown masked men around 11pm when he was taking a bath, and his family was held at gunpoint and his wife was asked about her husband’s whereabouts. He added that when Sheraz came out, he was also held at gunpoint and only allowed to wear his shoes, adding that his hands were fastened and his face was covered in front of his wife. He explained that Sheraz’s wife said that there were not only unknown persons but they were also accompanied by police personnel and police vehicles, who forcibly opened the children’s room and showed them that they were taking their father away to further traumatize them.