JAVAID-UR-RAHMAN AND SAID ALAM KHAN
ISLAMABAD/PESHAWAR - Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan Thursday rejected the invitation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to visit internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Bannu today (Friday), in view of his scheduled rally in Southern Punjab (Bahawalpur).
The prime minister, in his first visit to the camps of North Waziristan’s IDPs, invited PTI chief Imran to accompany him in Bannu. Imran Khan refused to go with Nawaz Sharif, saying he was due in Bahawalpur to attend the party’s rally.
“PTI chief Imran Khan has already commitment to go to Bahawalpur, so he is not going with the prime minister,” said PTI Vice Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi, talking to The Nation.
Qureshi further said Imran Khan had already visited the camps of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Bannu. “Imran Khan will again visit these camps to meet with the IDPs, “said the PTI senior lawmaker, adding the federal government had not taken the KP government into confidence regarding distribution of items and other matters.
“The KP government was kept in dark. It should have been taken into confidence,” he said, adding Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) is not interested in doing politics on this humanitarian matter. “With the coordination between Centre and the province, things could be dealt with amicably,” he opined.
The prime minister invitation to the PTI chief to join him at IDPs’ camp in Bannu came at the juncture when there are rumours that PTI’s Core Committee has decided to take resignations from all its members of the national and provincial assemblies as a protest against inaction of the government and ECP in verification of votes at least in four constituencies on NA.
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan, however, directed Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pervez Khattak to accompany Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif during his visit to IDPs camps in district Bannu.
Due to the NWA operation, over 450,000 tribesmen have so far left their homes and most of them reside either with relatives or in rented homes in Bannu, after refusing to live in the camps already established for them in the district.