ISLAMABAD: A top minister of Prime Minister Imran Khan's administration on Friday accused Jamiat Ulema-e Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Fazlur Rehman of having contacts with British spy agency MI6 besides secret rendezvous with India's National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. Speaking at a presser, the Minister for Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit-Baltistan Ali Amin Gandapur along with Minister for Information Shibli Faraz, accusing the heavyweight cleric, questioned: can Fazlur Rehman tell the nation what were the reasons of being in contact with MI6.
He continued that the cleric held a meeting with Ajit Doval, in which Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind's executive director Maulana Mehmood Ahmed Madni was also present.
"Tell the nation what was the reason behind the secret rendezvous with Ajit Doval," he questioned.
In the same breath, the minister accused the cleric of being in "contact with some foreign powers" ahead and during his "Azadi March" onto Islamabad in October 2019, soon after Prime Minister Khan highlighted the issue of Kashmir at the international level.
He also accused the JUI-F's top cleric of being involved in creating sectarian valence among Shia and Sunnis in the country, and getting foreign funding.
"I've irrefutable evidence against the cleric [Fazlur Rehman] of whatever I've said against him, and I dare him to drag me to the court, if he thinks these are mere allegations," he maintained.
He said that it was Maulana Fazlur Rehman who issued a religious decree against the then prime minister late Benazir Bhutto that a woman could not become the prime minister of an Islamic country, but withdrew his fatwa when she issued a permit to him for supplying diesel to Afghanistan.
"Now, that very cleric is heading the PDM, and rightly so...after all, he is a man who has great experience in theft and plundering national wealth, and those part of the PDM are also certified thieves," he added.
He said that the cleric had plundered the national kitty with billions of rupees by remaining in power with respective governments in the past, and now he knows no one can save him from accountability.
Gandapur said that he has collected concrete evidence about benami properties of Maulana Rehman worth billions of rupees.
Shibli Faraz said that the government would not come under any pressure due to the "drama' staged by the opposition parties through collection of resignations from their lawmakers to hide their past corruption.
He termed "resignation threat from the assemblies" as nothing but a "planned drama", as they would have no guts to submit them to the speaker.
About making contacts with opposition to call off their anti-government protests, Faraz vehemently denied the reports, saying "why would we contact them as we are a transparent and democratically-elected government".
He said that as the prime minister had openly stated that there would be talks on any issues except on the graft cases against them, adding, if the opposition wanted to talk on this condition, we are ready to hold talks with them.
However, the minister claimed that several MNAs and MPAs of the opposition parties - both the PPP and the PML-N - were in constant contact with the government as they were not willing to resign from the assemblies.
Faraz said that the opposition parties would fail in their designs, and they have no political future, adding their state of mind and bewilderment demonstrates that their politics stand buried.
He plainly stated that Prime Minister Imran Khan would not give any NRO to the corrupt leaders, adding giving NRO (national reconciliation ordinance) to the "thieves" means destroying the country as we have zero tolerance for the corrupt and the corruption.
In the same breath, he continued that the opposition leaders plundered the national wealth and stashed billions of dollars of taxpayers' money in foreign banks, which will be brought back at all cost.
"These are parties who have joined hands now to save their own skin; they have a history of doing dirty politics for their own vested interest and they are destined to be exposed once again soon," he added.
The minister regretted that the opposition parties were endangering the lives of the people by holding the public gatherings amid the rising cases of the Covid-19.
"We're confronting two kinds of pandemic in the country at the movement - the coronavirus and the opposition - the first one could be contained through precautionary measures but the other [the opposition] is bent upon spreading it for the sake of petty politics," he lamented.
Faraz said that we are not scared of their gatherings as it is their democratic right but we are concerned over the second wave of the Covid-19, which is proving to be more fatal.
He advised the opposition to postpone their gatherings for two to three months for the sake of people's lives, adding the positivity of Covid-19 cases in areas where these people held rallies has increased manifold.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020
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