ISLAMABAD – Pakistan’s powerful military said it supported the country’selected government and the constitution, as tens of thousands of oppositionprotesters gathered in the capital demanding that Prime Minister ImranKhan’s year-old government quits by Sunday.
“We believe in the law and the constitution and our support is with thedemocratically elected government, not with any party,” military spokesman,Major General Asif Ghafoor, said in comments to a television news channellate on Friday.
Earlier on Friday, the opposition had demanded that cricketstar-turned-politician Khan and his administration resign within two days,raising the stakes in a protest campaign that the government has denouncedas a threat to democracy.[image: PressTV-Protesters flood Islamabad streets, urge PM Khan to quit]link
The opposition says Khan’s government is illegitimate and is being proppedup by the military, which has ruled Pakistan for about half of its historyand determines security and foreign policy.
The military denies meddling in politics and Khan has dismissed the callsto step down.
The leader of the protest, religious party chief Fazl-ur-Rehman, told arally of tens of thousands of supporters that he did not want a “collisionwith institutions,” a thinly veiled reference to the military, and calledon them to be impartial.
General Ghafoor, said Rehman, should know the military was impartial and itshould not be dragged into politics.
Rehman, leader of the conservative Jamiat Ulema party, is a veteranpolitician who can mobilize significant support in religious schools acrossthe country.
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He was joined at the Friday rally, which police estimated was attended by35,000 people, by leaders of the two main opposition parties.
Protesters were camped out at the rally site on Saturday, cooking food andresting.
Rehman had earlier warned of chaos if the government did not step down, buton Friday he told the crowd they would decide what action to take if theirtwo-day sit-in at the rally site failed.
Security is tight in Islamabad with the government and diplomatic sector -just a few kilometres from the rally – sealed off, with shipping containersused to block roads.
Army chief, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, on Friday urged the government tohandle the protest peacefully.
The government, struggling to get the economy on track, has denounced theprotests as being a threat to the constitution and to democracy and hassaid it will not be allowed to paralyse the capital. – Reuters
