LAHORE / ISLAMABAD: A day before the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) was to announce its plan for holding a march towards the Jati Umra residence of the prime minister in Raiwind over the Panamagate issue, Nawaz Sharif loyalists on Saturday formed a group to ‘physically’ stop Imran Khan’s supporters from entering the area.

However, in an apparent strategy aimed at forestalling any confrontation between the workers of Mr Sharif’s PML-N and Mr Khan’s PTI, some leaders of the ruling party made it clear that they did not need to form any armed group when the PTI chairman himself was “after his own party with a baton in his hands”.

In Lahore, enthusiastic PML-N workers declared that they had formed a ‘baton-wielding force’ which would not allow Imran Khan and his supporters to enter Raiwind.

Nawaz Sharif loyalists set up ‘force’ to stop Imran supporters from marching on Raiwind

Named ‘Nawaz Sharif Janisar Force’, the loyalist group held demonstrations in Raiwind and Gujranwala on Saturday.

A number of the PML-N workers, including women, gathered at the Adda Plot, the possible venue for the PTI’s rally, to convey a warning to the PTI chief against coming there. Adda Plot is about 5km from Jati Umra.

“We will break the legs of PTI workers if they dared come to Raiwind,” Aqeel Ahmed, a PML-N worker wearing a headband inscribed with ‘Janisar Force’, told Dawn.

Another worker, brandishing an axe, said: “I warn Imran Khan not to even think about coming to Raiwind.”

Women workers were no less charged than their male party colleagues. Chanting slogans against the PTI leadership, they said: “We are here to give a strong message to Imran Khan to review his plan. Police may allow the PTI workers to come here but we will not.”

On the other side of the fence, the PTI has activated all of its wings and formed organising committees in all the nine districts of central Punjab to put up a successful show in Raiwind. “The PTI workers will not be holding flowers, if the PML-N workers try to disturb the party’s peaceful protest demonstration on Raiwind Road,” said PTI’s Punjab central region president Abdul Aleem Khan, while talking to Dawn.

Imran Khan ‘an unemployed man’!

In a tweet, Maryam Nawaz, daughter of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, blew hot and cold: asking the PML-N workers to stay calm but at the same time using spiteful words for Imran Khan.

“Earnest request to PML-N supporters. Stay calm and not read much into Raiwind dharna. Mr Khan is an unemployed, idle man who has to kill time,” she tweeted.

Muslim Students Federation president and Parliamentary Secretary on Youth Affairs in Punjab Assembly Rana Arshad said there had been no instruction to the workers to form any force to stop the PTI rally.

“In fact, it is the love of the PML-N workers for Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif which they are showing. But we will stop them from taking to the streets to challenge the PTI rally lest some ‘third force’ should take advantage of it,” Mr Arshad said.

Hamza Shahbaz, son of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, criticised Imran Khan for choosing Raiwind for his protest.

“Imran Khan has become personal after the failure of his sit-in in Islamabad two years ago. Marching on Raiwind shows that Imran Khan has become personal. His dream of becoming prime minister will never come true,” Hamza said, adding Mr Khan talked about accountability but he was in the company of land-grabbers and those who had got their loans waived.

PTI meeting today

In Islamabad, PTI’s Central Information Secretary Naeemul Haq released a statement, accusing the premier of backing the PML-N’s threatening moves.

“The armed groups are being formed in Punjab on the directive of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to stop people through violence from participating in the protest march,” it read.

The charge was immediately refuted by PML-N Information Secretary Senator Mushahidullah Khan, saying the party did not need to do so as people had already rejected the PTI’s “negative politics” and its Raiwind march was bound to fail.

Mr Khan has convened a meeting of the PTI in Islamabad on Sunday to finalise the plan for holding the march towards Raiwind to press for its demand for formation of a judicial commission to probe the Panamagate scam.

Earlier this month, while addressing a public meeting in Karachi, Mr Khan had announced that he would lead the march to Raiwind on Sept 24.

Later, apparently because of the criticism from other opposition parties and their reluctance to join hands with it, the PTI leadership announced that it would give the final date of the march after discussing the matter at a party meeting.

Most of the opposition parties, including the Pakistan Awami Tehreek of Dr Tahirul Qadri, have already refused to participate in the march, saying that holding of protests outside the private residences of political leaders was not a healthy political tradition.

Mr Haq declared that the prime minister would be directly responsible if any effort was made to turn their peaceful protest into a violent one.

“The prime minister must know that the armed groups will one day lead to his own fall,” he said, adding that the PTI had already faced the PML-N “goons” in different cities.

“The PML-N had already resorted to bloodshed and violence through its goons and politicised the police,” he alleged, adding that the PTI was determined to make the Raiwind march a success.

When contacted, Mr Mushahidullah alleged that Mr Khan was frustrated because he knew that his role from the country’s politics had ended.

He said that “wrong policies” of Mr Khan had actually created a “political vacuum” in the country as there was no political leadership at present which could replace Mr Sharif.

“The PML-N is not here to stay in power forever. But what will happen if tomorrow we will not be in the government,” he said, fearing that the next rulers would ruin the country.

The PML-N senator alleged that Mr Khan was setting “wrong political traditions” and laying foundations of “fascism”.

In response to a question, he denied that the prime minister had issued any directives to form any armed groups to stop the PTI’s march.

“Let them announce a date and the plan, then we will see how to handle it,” he said, adding that the PML-N had been handling Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri for the past three years and it would do so successfully in future as well.

Mansoor Malik also contributed to this report from Lahore

Published in Dawn, September 18th, 2016