The Jamaat-e-Islami protest against the petroleum levy is escalating.
JI emir Hafiz Naeemur Rehman told a press conference in Islamabad on Thursday that the party would expand its ongoing sit-ins into a nationwide wheel-jam and shutter-down strike in the week after 12th Rabiul Awwal, which falls on August 26, if its demands are not met (Dawn).
He also threatened protest camps across the country and raised the possibility of a march on Islamabad on foot.
The demand
The demand is the complete abolition of the petroleum levy.
Rehman rejected this week’s Rs32.63 cut in the price of high-speed diesel as insufficient, calling instead for a reduction of Rs130 a litre.
The distinction he is drawing is between the price and the tax. The diesel reduction was achieved through an arrangement with four Karachi refineries to absorb part of their margin. The levy itself was not reduced, and the government continues to collect Rs114 a litre in taxes and duties on petrol and Rs100 on diesel.
Both fuels rose again in Friday’s daily review.
Where the sit-ins are
The sit-ins began on August 16 and have now run six days.
Protesters have been stationed outside the Punjab Chief Minister’s House in Lahore and outside the governor’s houses in Karachi, Quetta and Peshawar. Dawn’s account of Thursday’s announcement lists Lahore, Karachi and Peshawar.
Mall Road in Lahore has been closed on both tracks, disrupting traffic through the centre of the city.
Addressing the Lahore sit-in earlier in the week, JI senior leader Liaquat Baloch said the federal government had failed to deliver over a span of more than two years. “The rulers are not ready to give up luxuries and protocol,” he said (Geo News).
No talks
Rehman said JI would not take part in government briefings, insisting instead that the rulers come directly to the protesters.
That leaves little in the way of an off-ramp before the 26th. A wheel-jam and shutter-down strike, if it holds, would close transport and commerce in the same week that the goods transporters’ suspension of their own strike — agreed for 40 days after government assurances — is still running.
