Hafiz Saeed
Hafiz Saeed-linked Milli Muslim League (MML) has decided to use the platform of a little known party, Allah-o-Akbar Tehreek (AAT), to contest the upcoming general election. The decision has come a day after Pakistan's poll panel rejected for a second time an application by the MML, an offshoot of the Mumbai attack mastermind's banned Jamat-ud-Dawah, to register it as a political party.
Around 200 candidates backed by the MML will contest the July 25 election under the banner of AAT, which is already registered with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), the Express Tribune reported.
The decision was taken after the ECP again dismissed the MML's application for registration on Wednesday.
The MML has announced that candidates backed by the party will be participating from the platform of the AAT if higher courts do not rule in their favour before the election. The AAT is listed at number 10 in the ECP's list of approved parties. The AAT, a little known party, is headed by Mian Ihsan Bari from Bahawalpur.
The MML had earlier challenged the October 11, 2017 order of the ECP declining registration to the MML as a political party allegedly on the behest of the Pakistan's interior ministry.
The interior ministry had opposed enlisting of the MML as a political party arguing it's an offshoot of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa of Hafiz Saeed banned under a UN resolution.
The JuD formed MML at the time when Saeed was detained in Lahore. Saeed and his four aides - Abdullah Ubaid, Malik Zafar Iqbal, Abdul Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Hussain - were placed under house arrest in Lahore on January 30 under anti- terrorism act.
The JuD was declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the US in June 2014. The JuD chief also carries a USD 10 million American bounty on his head for his role in terror activities.
(With PTI inputs)
