- Says PTI to stay on streets until the release of its founder, even ‘if it costs them their lives’
SWABI: Former National Assembly speaker Asad Qaiser on Friday reiterated the PTI’s resolve to stay on the streets until its founder Imran Khan and party leaders were released, saying they are ready to lay down lives for the success of this movement.
“Until the founding chairman Imran Khan is released, we will remain on the streets, and if we have to take bullets for the success of this movement, we will”, he declared while addressing a public protest held in Topi, Swabi as part of the party’s countrywide protest on Friday.
Asad Qaiser told a charged audience that they have three main objectives: “first, the release of our innocent prisoners including founding chairman Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi; second, relief from the government’s back-breaking inflation; and third, the deteriorating law and order situation in the country, especially in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.”
“God forbid if it costs us our lives, we don’t care because life and death are in the hands of God hands and death will come someday”, he reiterated, adding that he would personally lead this movement.
He said that he had spent 29 years of his life with Imran Khan, but currently, he was unjustly imprisoned and conspiracies were being made against him. “At this moment, the people of entire Swabi district stand behind our leader like a rock”, he declared.
The former NA speaker said that he had stated in the assembly that if the government conducted an operation in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, it will have to pass over his dead body. “By the grace of Allah Almighty, we raised a strong voice in the assembly, and the government had to back down from the operation”, he claimed.
The PTI stalwart said that he had conveyed a message to the party leadership and Imran Khan that he doesn’t want any party position or any post in the standing committees of the National Assembly.
“The love of my people and their trust is enough for me and is real assets to me”, he pointed out.
He predicted that the time to get rid of this ‘mandate-thief’ government was drawing near as it’s been standing on shaky ground and has only a few months left. Apparently alluding to Premier Shehbaz Sharif, the PTI leader said that “you are kidnapping our MNAs, offering them money and ministries, and those who refuse are being threatened with fake cases.” “How long do you think you can run the government this way? You have to leave this year”, he declared.
The former NA speaker said that the government had made the lives of the poor miserable, adding that it had become difficult to have two meals a day. He said that you have made petrol expensive, electricity expensive, making it hard for the people to understand whether to eat or pay the electricity bill. “You (rulers) have invited the wrath of the public and when the public rises, there will be no trace of you left”, he warned.
