Children of Jinnahs close associates urge Musharraf to restore democracy

Urging Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf to withdraw the emergency, children of several close associates of Mohammad Ali Jinnah have pleaded with him not to betray the Father of the Nation and the freedom fighters who sacrificed their lives to bring Pakistan into being.

Karachi, Nov 17 : Urging Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf to withdraw the emergency, children of several close associates of Mohammad Ali Jinnah have pleaded with him not to betray the Father of the Nation and the freedom fighters who sacrificed their lives to bring Pakistan into being.

In a letter sent to Musharraf, they recalled that creation of Pakistan was achieved by moral and intellectual force, besides the might of the pen "for which there is no parallel in the history of the world."

The Dawn also quoted them as saying that the Musharraf regime's recent actions had seriously jeopardised the judiciary.

"The well-being of the country demands the immediate withdrawal of the Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO), the proclamation of emergency and all other recently enacted laws that have curtailed the freedom of speech and expression, along with laws that permit the arrest and detention of people without a judicial trial by an independent judiciary," they said.

They quoted the Jinnah as telling civil officers in Sibi on February 14, 1948 that the "Government in Pakistan is in the hands of the people ... based on fundamental principles of democracy, not bureaucracy or autocracy or dictatorship."

They also recalled that while addressing the American people in February 1948, Jinnah had said: "Islam and its idealism have taught us democracy. It has taught us equality of men, justice and fair-play to everybody. We are inheritors of these glorious traditions."

Referring to another speech on Criminal Law Emergency Powers Bill on Feb 6, 1919, they said Jinnah had declared "no man should lose his liberty without a judicial trial in accordance with accepted rules and evidence and procedure."

The letter has been written by Ashraf and Akber (sons of Liaquat Ali Khan), Laila Sarfaraz and Yusuf Haroon (daughter and son of Abdullah Haroon), Atiya Shujaat Hasan (daughter of Nawab Mohammad Ismail Khan), Zia Ispahani (son of M.A.H. Ispahani), Qazi Faez and Qazi Azmat (sons of Qazi Mohammad Isa), Talat Shuaib Qureshi (granddaughter of Maulana Mohammad Ali), Abdullah Hussain Haroon (grandson of Abdullah Haroon), Rukhsana Abbasi (granddaughter of Saadullah Khan) and Samiullah Askari (great grandson of Nawab Salimullah of Dhaka).

ANI