ISLAMABAD: A rally organized by Tehreek-e-Labaik Pakistan (TLP) against an anti-Islam cartoon contest is expected to reach the country’s federal capital by Thursday night, as all attempts by the newly-elected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government failed to avert the march, officials told Arab News.
The competition organized by Geert Wilders, a Dutch parliamentarian and leader of the far-right Freedom Party, is slated for November this year.
“We will reach Islamabad tonight and hold a sit-in until the government accepts our demands and expels the Dutch ambassador,” Pir Ejaz Ahmad Ashrafi, central TLP leader, said.
He confirmed that the government’s representatives had held several negotiations with TLP’s leadership but “no concrete development has taken place so far.”
Ashrafi said that thousands of participants would peacefully register their protest and ask the government to meet their “genuine demand” as quickly as possible to avoid any disruption of public life.
The rally, led by TLP’s wheelchair-bound chief, Khadim Husain Rizvi, began from Lahore on Wednesday afternoon. The participants spent the night in Gujrat, a district of Punjab province, and set off for Islamabad in the morning.
Their movement was, however, blocked briefly at Jhelum by the local administration. “Jhelum’s district administration tried to convince us to call off our protest rally, but we refused,” Ashrafi said.
Earlier, Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, Noorul Haq Qadri, held a meeting with the TLP chief to convince him to cancel his march, arguing that the government had already taken enough steps to raise the issue at all international forums.
Taking cognizance of the matter, Prime Minister Imran Khan formed a four-member committee on Thursday to resolve the issue. In addition to Qadri, other members in the committee include Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Punjab Law Minister Raja Basharat and Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry.
“We desire a peaceful resolution of the issue through negotiations with the TLP leadership,” Chaudhry said in a statement.
Pakistan’s parliament has unanimously condemned Wilders’ plans to hold the anti-Islam cartoon contest which encourages participants to draw caricatures of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).
Following a protest by Pakistan’s Foreign Office and other Muslim countries, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte termed Wilders’ move as “not respectful,” distancing his government from the plan. However, he refused to ban the competition on the grounds that he would not curtail “freedom of speech.”
With the rally approaching the federal capital, Islamabad’s district administration began bringing in shipping containers to secure the Red Zone – a place that houses the most important state installations, such as the Parliament House, Supreme Court, and diplomatic enclave – and other sensitive locations.
“We have devised an elaborate security plan to deal with the protesters,” Muhammad Naeem, spokesperson for Islamabad Police, told Arab News. “We have requested additional contingents of Rangers and Frontier Constabulary to deal with any untoward incident.”
Political analysts say the government should start negotiating with the TLP leadership as early as possible to avert the sit-in in Islamabad.
“One thing is for sure: The government is not in a position to expel the Dutch ambassador to Pakistan as the Dutch government has already distanced itself from the planned cartoon contest,” Professor Tahir Malik, an academic and political analyst, said.
“The government is in a catch-22 situation, but it needs to devise a way to deal with the protestors sensibly,” he added. “Effective negotiations with the protestors should be the only strategy the government must employ.”
