LAHORE: Ameer, Jamaat e Islami, Senator Sirajul Haq, has demanded that all those involved in the Karachi Baldia Town factory tragedy three years ago be brought to justice in order to ensure lasting peace in the port city.
Addressing central leaders of the party in Islamabad on Saturday, he said it was an irony that those responsible for the burning to death of nearly two hundred factory workers were roaming around in the port city freely and the law enforcement agencies had failed to trace them, while the near and dear ones of the victims were in a state of anguish and anxiety. He said that as long as the culprits and their patrons were not brought to justice, peace in Karachi would remain a dream.
The meeting expressed deep grief over the tragedy in the Haram Sharif in Makkah and prayed for those martyred there.
Addressing the party men, Sirajul Haq counseled the rulers to dissociate themselves from the plunderers around them instead of offering their own defense and corner the corrupt in every walk of life. He said that unless and until those benefitting from the notorious NRO were hauled up, all claims of wiping out corruption or accountability would remain hollow. He said that the proper place for the people looting the public money was jail and not the corridors of power. He warned that if the NAB or FIA tried to do favour to any, the whole process of accountability would become doubtful.
The JI chief said that in order to show their seriousness for ending corruption from the country, the rulers would have to dissociate themselves from such elements in their party and the cabinet whose sole concern was to mint money. As long as the ruling party fails to take action against the corrupt within its own ranks, the others would keep on terming the operation as victimization. He said if the party leadership itself patronized the corrupt and placed hurdles in the process of accountability, those harming the country and the nation in the name of politics could not be taken to task. The political parties should on their won, expel the black sheep in their own ranks and hand them over to the law, he added.
Sirajul Haq said it was the government’s responsibility to trace the people whose 200 billion dollars were lying in Swiss Banks. Steps should be taken to retrieve this money as was badly needed for development and welfare projects at home. If the government was successful in bringing back this money, it would be saved from the humiliation of begging from the MF and the World Bank.
