The Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) has announced the end of its sit-in outside the Governor House in Karachi, which was held against inflation and in demand for the withdrawal of the petroleum levy.
According to a spokesperson for Jamaat-e-Islami, party workers would join the long march from Sunday morning. The party’s long march will begin from Karachi.
Jamaat-e-Islami chief Hafiz Naeemur Rehman will address party workers at Cantt Station. Subsequently, workers would participate in the long march by train under his leadership.
The sit-in was part of a nationwide protest campaign launched by Jamaat-e-Islami against the levy imposed on petroleum products.
Hafiz Naeemur Rehman on Saturday warned that the movement for the abolition of the petroleum levy would turn into a drive to topple the government if the levy was not abolished.
Addressing the participants of the JI’s sit-in at the Governor House on, he announced the winding up of the 35-day sit-in outside the Sindh Governor House, saying the protest movement would now continue with a train march from Karachi to Islamabad.
Read more: JI to back-step from talks if demands not met: Hafiz Naeem
Hafiz Naeem congratulated the JI Karachi workers, women, elderly people and young participants for sustaining what he described as a “historic” protest against the petroleum levy and independent power producer (IPP) agreements.
He said traders, industrialists, lawyers, religious scholars, teachers, students, poets, writers and people from different schools of thought had participated in the sit-in. “The centre of attention of the whole of Karachi was not the Governor House but the sit-in staged in front of it,” he said.
The party says the objective is to pressure the government to withdraw the petroleum levy and provide meaningful relief to the public.
Despite negotiations between the two sides, Jamaat-e-Islami maintains that temporary relief is insufficient and that a reduction in taxes is necessary.
