Punjab Governor visits Mansoora

Jamaat-e-Islami Chief, Syed Munawar Hasan, has said benefits of the PPP's conciliation policy should also reach the common man. He was talking to the media during the Punjab Governor, Sardar Latif Khosa's visit at Mansoora on Thursday. The other members of the delegation were provincial Ministers Raja Riaz, Ashraf Sohna and Farooq Ghurki besides Azizur Rahman Chann.
Earlier, the Governor told media persons that he was visiting the JI headquarter on a directive of President Zardari, Prime Minister Gilani and PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, and has a message of conciliation. He said that conciliation has been part of the politics of Z.A. Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto, and the 1973 Constitution was the best example. He said, the PPP wanted to promote mutual harmony and brotherhood in the country and he was meeting heads of political parties with a view to bury politics of hatred and build Pakistan as a citadel of peace.
The JI chief, however, emphasised that conciliation policy should aim at resolving the people's problems and not for usurping their rights. He said, during the last three years, only the ruling party and its allies had benefited out of this conciliation. He said that nobody wanted confrontation. However, he said, if conciliatory politics was simply meant serving the interests of the parties and their leaders, the JI could not support that.
Referring to the Blasphemy Law, the JI chief made it clear that if the government failed to allay the fears of the masses with regard to the Blasphemy Law, things would go out of hand. He reiterated that as long as the Prime Minister Gilani did not give an assurance at the National Assembly that the Blasphemy Law would not be amended, the resentment among the people would be natural. He stressed that the government should expel Vatican's representative in Islamabad, disband the Shahbaz Bhatti committee and withdraw Sherry Rahman's amendment bill. The government should also officially condemn the statement of the Pope and the European Union on this issue and if the US demanded handing over Aasia Masih, the woman convicted for blasphemy, there should be protest on that at official level, he added. The JI deputy chief, Chaudhry Muhammad Aslam Saleemi, Secretary General, Liaquat Baloch and other party leaders were also present.