PTI Chairman Gohar Ali Khan. PHOTO: EXPRESS
RAWALPINDI:
PTI Chairman Gohar Ali Khan has said that if talks have been reduced to the level of a “meeting of five elders”, then such talks should be rejected outright.
“There is no need for such a meeting nor can the five elders meet,” Gohar said on Tuesday outside Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail, where PTI founder Imran Khan is being held.
Gohar was reacting to a statement by Advisor to the Prime Minister Rana Sanaullah.
While speaking to a private news channel on January 1, Sanaullah said that “confidence-building measures” between five major players in the country would improve the overall political situation.
“Two of them are my leaders, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Nawaz Sharif. The third is President Asif Ali Zardari, the fourth is President Asif Ali Zardari. [incarcerated PTI leader] Imran Khan and everyone knows who the fifth one is,” Sanaullah said.
Days after an opposition alliance – TTAP – aired its demand while also announcing “a wheel stoppage and shutdown” protest on the second anniversary of “heavily rigged” elections on February 8, the prime minister on December 23 offered an olive branch to the PTI.
The PTI, however, stated that it could not enter negotiations “from a weak position” as it continued to prepare for a street movement.
Referring to his statement from last Tuesday, Gohar clarified that his statement about “begging for meetings” had been distorted.
Speaking to reporters outside Adiala Jail on December 30, Gohar was reported to have said that not only outsiders but also “people from inside” were complicit in forcing them to “beg” the authorities for a meeting with the PTI founder.
“No matter how intense a street movement becomes, there is no alternative to dialogue,” he had said, adding that there were no instructions from Imran to stop the talks.
Gohar clarified that what he meant was that if, despite court orders, SOPs and jail rules, they are not allowed to meet Imran Khan, then it actually amounts to begging.
“If meetings are not allowed, any kind of negotiations become meaningless. Making meetings controversial will not move the matter forward,” he said. He warned that both sides would have to pay a high price to normalize the situation.
Gohar said they visit every Tuesday and return without a meeting and for over a month, no one has been allowed to meet the party founder.
He said PTI’s efforts to improve the situation were met with equal efforts from the other side to worsen it. He said the greatest strength of the PTI founder and his party lay in its workers who have endured all kinds of hardships imposed by the state.
He announced that a shutdown and wheel stoppage strike would be observed across the country on February 8 and that the party would hold full-scale protests on that day. He said that to normalize the situation, meetings with sisters and lawyers were essential.
Separately, PTI General Secretary Salman Akram Raja said that PTI has no chairman other than Imran Khan. He said there was no point in holding any kind of talks without the PTI founder.
Rejecting allegations that the party was responsible to Aleema Khan, he said there was no truth in such allegations. He said their first and last demand was a meeting with the party founder.
