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ISLAMABAD: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) activists have been booked for raising slogans at the tomb of former president General Zia-ul-Haq in Islamabad.
A case has been registered at the Margala police station on the complaint of the senior vice president of Pakistan Muslim League-Zia (PML-Z) Ismail Qureshi, stating the activist violating the sanctity of the grave.
PPP leader Malik Wasif Ali Khokhar and other party workers have been booked. The complainant said the act sparked anger among the party workers. Police have started action after registering a case.
On March 9, enraged PPP workers reached the tomb of the former president and army chief General Zia-ul-Haq and chanted slogans of “Jiye Bhutto”. The activists were enroute to Islamabad’s D-Chowk for a political rally and reached the tomb of the former president in the vicinity of Faisal Mosque.
Gen Zia-ul-Haq remains the arch-nemesis of PPP activists and a polarising figure. He assumed power in a military coup on July 5, 1977, removing prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. He remained the country’s longest-serving head of state, ruling more than eleven years.
Gen Zia deposed Bhutto in a military coup and declared martial law on 5 July 1977. Bhutto was controversially tried by the Supreme Court and executed less than two years later. Zia died in a plane crash on 17 August 1988.