QUETTA: Chaotic scenes erupted outside Balochistan Assembly today (Friday) as Opposition lawmakers and supporters, who were holding protests, were baton-charged by the district police.
According to a police spokesperson, Opposition lawmakers had locked all four doors of the provincial Assembly to prevent the budget session from taking place. The Opposition’s protest intensified when the chief minister arrived at the assembly.
However, the situation outside the assembly is still tense and it is not known for sure whether the session will be held today or not. The parliament had been convened today at 4:00pm to present the budget.
Clashes erupted when police arrived at the assembly gate at the Member of Provincial Assembly (MPA) Hostel when Opposition lawmakers and police exchanged heated words. Police, at the moment, are trying to open the doors of the assembly so that lawmakers can enter and the budget session can commence.
Three BNP MPAs – Babu Abdul Raheem, Ahmed Nawaz and Shakila Naveed Dhewar – and one JUI-F MPA, Abdul Wahid Siddique sustained injuries during the clash.
Following the administration’s failure to open the assembly building, negotiations were underway between Quetta Deputy Commissioner Aurangzeb Badini and opposition leader Advocate Malik Sikandar Khan.
Meanwhile, Balochistan government spokesperson Liaquat Shahwani has said that no constituency had been ignored in the budget proposals. He added that multiple development projects such as Sariab Road had been launched in opposition constituencies.
Earlier on Thursday, workers of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, Balochistan National Party and Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party blocked nearly all highways in a protest against “the neglect of opposition constituencies in the provincial budget”.
The workers of the parties staged sit-ins at all national highways, including highway in Chaman, Quetta-Karachi International Highway, Zhob-DI Khan, Gwadar coastal highway.
The closure of national highways caused severe hardships to the people, especially women and children. The highways remained closed from 7:00 am to 2:00 pm, as was decided in the announcement of the protest a day earlier.
