LAHORE: The Parliamentary Advisory Council of the Jamaat-e-islami, has said that the Panama leaks issue was a scar on the country’s history and the delaying tactics of the government in a bid to escape accountability in mega corruption scandal were only defaming the country at world level.
The JI advisory body which met at Mansoora with the JI Ameer, Senator Sirajul Haq in the chair, noted that while seventy per cent of the country’s population did not have safe drinking water, and more than forty per cent was living below poverty line, the rulers were building palaces for luxurious living.
It further pointed out that the general public was being denied the right of education and health. Around twenty million children of school going age were compelled to do odd jobs to supplement family earnings and each bed in government hospital was having three patients.
Recalling the weaknesses of the present electoral system as felt during the 2013 elections, the JI advisory body called for major electoral reforms to ensure fair, free and transparent elections in 2018 to strengthen democracy. In this respect, it suggested fixing ceiling of spending by candidates and parties so that people of moderate means could also contest elections.
It also reiterated its demand for holding elections under the system of proportionate representations so that the influence of wealth was minimized.
The council demanded immediate solution of the IDPs issue. It noted that the IDPs had rendered huge sacrifices to for the security of the country but the government was not taking the issue seriously.
The meeting also called upon the government to withdraw its decision to cancel the computerized national Identity cards of the residents of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Karachi.
It also demanded that the provincial local governments act be amended to grant powers and financial assistance to the local bodies in Balochistan.
The meeting expressed deep concern over the rulers efforts to push the constitution into back ground and promoting dictatorial rule. It condemned the unconstitutional and un-Islamic law passed by the Sindh Assembly and termed it in violation of the Pakistan’s ideology and the Objectives Resolution.
It It stressed that any law concerning religion must be routed through the Council of Islamic Ideology.
