PML-N’s middle stump will be uprooted soon, says Khan

• PTI chief says he will present evidence of rigging in NA-122 to judicial commission which would put NA speaker’s membership at risk
• PTI workers and office-bearers manhandle media persons at rally venue

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan told a public rally here on Friday that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government’s middle stump would soon be knocked over.

Khan was referring to the upcoming hearing of the judicial commission, where he said he will present evidence of rigging in Lahore’s NA-122— the constituency where Imran Khan lost to PML-N’s Ayaz Sadiq in the 2013 general election.

The PTI chief went on to say that 2015 will be the year of elections.

Taking a jab at the PML-N, Khan said the “national exchequer is being wasted on projects like metro bus”. The PTI chief also criticised Punjab Police for its inefficiency. “It is the taxpayers’ money that goes into paying the IG Punjab’s salary, not the chief minister’s personal funds,” he remarked.

“Hiring in police is done on a political basis, keeping merit aside, which is the main reason incidents like Safoora Goth massacre keep on happening,” he claimed.

But Imran Khan was all praise for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police, saying that all hiring and postings there were done purely on merit.

Earlier, there were reports that PTI office-bearers and workers misbehaved with media persons and manhandled them at the district sports ground, which was the venue of PTI’s public meeting.

According to details, the trouble started when PTI workers asked the crew of a private news channel to move their DSNG van out of the ground and upon refusal, they threatened to set the DSNG van on fire.

PTI workers reportedly pushed the DSNG van engineer and other journalists and manhandled them. They also misbehaved with a Lahore-based female anchorperson. Upon this, the media crew boycotted the event and went outside the premises.

Later, PTI-backed MNA Malik Amir Dogar and PTI District President Ijaz Janjua apologised to media personnel and persuaded them to return to the venue of the public meeting.

The incident sparked swift condemnation from media organisations. Multan Union of Journalists (MUJ) president Abdul Rauf Maan said the Multan incident clearly showed PTI had lived up to its reputation. He added that they had also misbehaved with female media persons during their last public meeting in Multan and in other big cities.

PTI workers had also resorted to such violent behaviour with media persons at Islamabad and other cities during such events and the issue was raised at the forum of PFUJ.