LAHORE: The party of Mahmood Khan Achakzai, who is the opposition’s nominee for president, said on Monday police had raided the leader’s residence in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta a day earlier, vowing to launch protests over what it called a government-backed crackdown against political opponents.
Achakzai, 75, is the chief of the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) from the southwestern Balochistan province and was nominated by Imran Khan, the jailed leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, to contest against former president Asif Ali Zardari, the presidential nominee of the coalition government led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. In Parliament, Achakzai would be supported by the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), the new home of PTI-backed independent lawmakers.
The PTI had complained of a state-backed crackdown against the party in the run-up to Feb. 8 general elections and says the polls were rigged and results manipulated to keep the PTI and its loyalists out of the government. Opposition parties, including the PTI, have staged nationwide protests against the alleged rigging, which the election commission denies.
The raid on Achakzai’s house took place on Sunday night and is being widely linked to a speech he made in the inaugural session of the National Assembly on Friday in which he called on parliament to declare that the country’s powerful military establishment should not interfere in politics.
For several years, the military has denied it meddles in politics. But it has in the past directly intervened to topple civilian governments and to manage political matters from behind the scenes even when it is not directly ruling. No Pakistani prime minister has completed a full five-year term since the country was born in 1947.
“Achakzai has submitted his nomination papers for the next presidential election against the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) backed presidential candidate, Asif Ali Zardari,” Abdul Rahim Ziaratwal, PkMAP central secretary-general, told Arab News, condemning Sunday’s raid and calling it a reaction by “powerful forces” who did not want to see the supremacy of parliament in Pakistan.
“Hence the newly elected coalition government started these non-political acts against their opponents.”
He said PkMAP had called nationwide protests against the raid on Mahmood Khan Achakzai’s residence “because PkMAP has a long history of struggle for the supremacy of the parliament.”
Speaking to reporters on Sunday night, Balochistan’s Caretakter Information Minister Jan Achakzai denied police had raided the PkMAP chief’s house but that the district administration had carried out an operation to retain control of a plot of land in front of Achakzai’s residence which been seized by a land-grabber.
He said a guard, who was part of the PkMAP’s security team, resisted the operation, causing local police to arrest him.
“There is no truth to reports that a raid was conducted at the house of elderly politician, presidential nominee and Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party’s Chairman Mahmood Khan Achakzai, or that the sanctity of his house was violated,” the minister added.
The Sunni Ittehad Council party, backed by ex-PM Khan’s legislators, nominated Achakzai as their candidate for the presidential election, scheduled for Mar. 9.
The president in Pakistan is elected through an electorate that comprises legislators from both houses of Pakistan’s parliament, the Senate, and the National Assembly, as well as the country’s four provincial assemblies.
Elected for a five-year term, the president is a ceremonial head of state that has limited powers while the prime minister, who heads the government, has the executive powers to manage the country’s affairs.