Centre interfering in NWFP govt’s affairs, says Qazi

* Denies accountability group in MMA
* Says religious alliance bound to legislate Hasba Bill

Staff Report

PESHAWAR: Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) Chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed said on Friday that the federal government was illegally interfering in the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) government’s affairs and that the religious alliance would foil all such plots.

The JI chief said there was no pressure group or accountability group within the MMA and that this was just propaganda by the MMA’s opponents.

He said he would call Deputy Speaker Ikramullah Shahid and MMA Provincial Information Secretary Mufti Kafayatullah to settle the matter.

Mr Hussain, who was talking to reporters at Masjid Mohabbat Khan, criticised the countrywide crackdown on religious seminaries, saying the action was being taken at the behest of the United States. “The US and its allies want to defame Islam and Muslims and the crackdown on religious institutions is part of that drive,” the JI chief said. Mr Hussain asked the government to change the pro-US policies, warning that the religious alliance would launch an agitation against the government if it did not change its pro-US policies.

The MMA leader said the provincial government was bound to enforce the Hasba Act as the law would solve the problems of the people and ensure implementation of Sharia. He said the Hasba Act was neither a parallel judicial system nor contrary to the country’s laws or Holy Quran and Sunnah.

On the Council of the Islamic Ideology’s (CII) rejecting the Hasba Bill by, he said: “When the CII doesn’t exist, how can it reject or accept something?” The JI head said the people wanted an Islamic system and this is why had voted for the MMA.

“We’ll do away with obscenity, enforce the Nizam-e-Salaat and streamline the zakat system,” he said. He stressed the need for unity among Muslims to stop “infidels” from committing atrocities against Muslims in Kashmir, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and other parts of the world.

“Muslims should unite to counter the terrorism of the Western countries, particularly the US,” he said.

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