Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) Chairman Sahibzada Hamid Raza has claimed that Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif and incumbent Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif used the Faizabad sit-in against state institutions, ARY News reported.
The PML-N had helped the sit-in reach Islamabad and asked party workers to participate in the protest, he said while speaking during the ARY News show “Eleventh Hour” on Thursday.
He claimed possessing evidence of PML-N’s double-crossing during the 2017 Faizabad sit-in, saying that former Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa (Retd) and General Faiz Hameed (Retd) also knew about the PML-N’s role in the protest.
According to Hamid Raza, the then Punjab government helped stage the sit-in while PML-N workers in Rawalpindi were directed to ensure people’s participation in the sit-in.
For the SIC chief, the objectives of the Faizabad sit-in were right, however, he alleged that the sit-in was sabotaged through planning by including people who raised slogans against state institutions.
Read more: Faizabad commission gives ‘clean chit’ to Faiz Hameed
He claimed that PML-N workers were also among those who received money during the sit-in while the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) was used in the sit-in.
It is pertinent to mention that the inquiry commission, constituted to investigate the sit-in staged at Faizabad Interchange in Islamabad in 2017, gave a clean chit to former spy chief Faiz Hameed.
The TLP on November 08, 2017, held a sit-in at Faizabad interchange against the amendments in the Election Act 2017, changing the word oath to declaration.
Ex-PEMRA chief Absar Alam – in response submitted to Supreme Court – said that former ISI chief Faiz Hameed pressurised the media regulatory authority during the Faizabad sit-in.
The federal government established an inquiry commission, headed by retired Inspector General Akhtar Ali Shah, in response to the Supreme Court’s rejection of the Fact-Finding Committee report.
However, the inquiry commission – in its 149-page report issued today – gave clean chit to the former spy chief.
The commission maintained that the then DG ISI and Army Chief had given permission to Faiz Hameed for the agreement. The report added that then Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal were also taken on board for the agreement.
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