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Pakistani cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, member of the opposition and Chairman of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, on Monday announced that it will renounce its parliamentary seats after a row with the government regarding alleged poll fraud.
Khan claims that the general elections last year, in which his PTI party came third, were rigged, and demanded that current Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif should resign and that new polls need to be held.
The dramatic resignations came as the Pakistani government tried to initiate formal talks with the politician and popular cleric Tahir-ul-Qadri, who is also leading a protest calling for new elections.
Khan, addressing his workers on Monday evening, said that he will march to capital city Islamabad’s high-security “Red Zone” with his supporters and party workers on Tuesday.
“I will lead the march on the Red Zone and my workers will follow me”, he told protesters, while asking party workers to remain peaceful.
Islamabad’s heavily guarded “Red Zone” houses the government’s top government buildings and several foreign embassies.
Qadri and Khan had on Saturday led several thousands of supporters on a “long march” to Islamabad from the city of Lahore in the hope of mobilizing a movement to dislodge Sharif. However, Khan’s protest failed to attract the crowds he promised, and on Monday, other opposition parties ignored his call for civil disobedience, leaving him isolated.
Shah Mehmood Qureshi, vice-chairman of the PTI, announced the mass resignations of their lawmakers on Monday afternoon.
“We are resigning from the National Assembly, Punjab Assembly, Baluchistan Assembly and Sindh Assembly”, Qureshi said.
He added that his party was still deciding about what it will do in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, where it is still in power. The resignations will need to be sent to the national assembly speaker, which will then be passed to the election commission.