PTI leaders accuse PPP of using police to win elections

A group of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) lawmakers met SP Rao Aslam at the Memon Goth Police Station on Thursday to register a case about firing at Sindh Assembly opposition leader Haleem Adil Sheikh and an assault on their party workers during Tuesday’s by-election in provincial assembly constituency PS-88 in District Malir.

PTI Karachi chief and MPA Khurrum Sher Zaman led the delegation that comprised MPAs Saeed Afridi, Shehzad Qureshi and Malik Shehzad Awan, the PTI candidate for the PS-88 by-poll, and a team of lawyers.

Later, talking to the media, Zaman claimed that SP Rao Aslam refused to register a case of assault on Sheikh. “The police refusal to register a case is utter injustice,” he said. “On the polling day, the media had exposed everything that happened during the PS-88 by-poll, but despite that police have not registered a case.”

Zaman said that since the start of polling on Tuesday, PTI leaders had been receiving complaints that the party’s polling agents had been taken out of polling stations and women members had been harassed

“When opposition leader Sheikh arrived there, Pakistan Peoples Party goons tried to torture him and opened fire on his car,” Zaman alleged and said the status of the opposition leader was equivalent to that a provincial minister, and that the party believed his life was in danger.

“We hoped that the police would take into account both aspects of the incident impartially, but, unfortunately, we regret that the police acted with prejudice and unfairness throughout the incident.”

Zaman said police on the behalf of the PPP had been arresting PTI workers and leaders across the province, including Karachi, and it showed that the ruling party in the province believed in the policy of victimisation of political opponents.

“We urge the higher courts to take notice of the Sindh government’s vengeful actions against the PTI workers.” The PTI leader said the PPP had been using police for political purposes, mainly to win elections, for the past several years and it happened in the PS-88 by-poll too. He demanded of the police to be free, independent, and accountable to the people of the province, not to Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and Murad Ali Shah.