The Awami Workers Party (AWP) has condemned in the strongest words the vandalism and violence by lawyers at a hospital resulting in the death of two patients and calls for a judicial inquiry into the incident.
AWP has also expressed dismay at the incident of violence erupted at International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI) campus while demanding an independent probe into the matter.
The party is of the view that those who claim to be custodians of law tend to violate it in a criminal manner.
These and other incidents of gender-based and faith-based violence against minor children, women, and marginalized segments of society, indicate the rising extremist tendencies and social, economic and institutional breakdown, due to the apathy of the ruling clique, the establishment, and the disastrous economic and government policies of the current rulers, said AWP general secretary Akhtar Hussain and deputy secretary Ismat Shahjehan.
They cautioned that Pakistani society is sliding fast towards anarchy.
On Wednesday, hundreds of lawyers stormed the Punjab Institute of Cardiology in Lahore after videos emerged on social media showing certain doctors from the hospital mocking the black coats over an ongoing dispute between the two sides.
The mayhem created by the bunch of lawyers is shameful and should be condemned, said Mr Hussain, who is also a member of the Pakistan Bar Council.
He urged bar associations and senior lawyers to take steps and enforce rules to curbing such incidents in the future.
Ms Shahjehan also expressed dismay over the incidents of violence. However, she said, AWP deems the idea of deploying rangers to restore civil order in the cities as well as at the academic institutions totally uncalled for and termed it tantamount to a creeping coup.
She said that the society is on the brink of imploding like a volcano due to rising frustration, anxiety and anger among various sections of society including doctors, lawyers, students due to overarching security policy which drives power and promotes patriarchy, as well as unemployment, poverty, misgovernance and shrinking space of freedom of expression.
She called for strengthening civilian law enforcement agencies and enhancing their capacity to perform law enforcement duties effectively, she said.
The AWP leaders called for unity of the Left, progressive forces to fight against the neoliberal fascist forces and dismantle this exploitative socio-economic system and set up a just, egalitarian and progressive society free from all kinds of discrimination and exploitation on the basis of class, creed, ethnicity, gender, and faith.
The act of violence that occurred at IIUI also reflects the same sorry state of affairs of the diminishing level of tolerance in society, which was related to the absence of democratic freedoms and institutions like student unions for decades, said AWP young leader Ammar Rashid.
He was of the opinion that the tragic incident is in part a consequence of the student union ban, depoliticization of campuses and the complete absence of a healthy student political culture of non-violent electoral competition. Without campus democracy and elections, student politics has degenerated into identity-based turf wars. This has allowed armed thugs and militant wings to dominate the underground student politics that resulted in pitting students against each other on religious, ethnic and sectarian lines, prevented them from being able to engage with and understand each other’s differences.
The only solution to this culture of violence lies in the restoration of peaceful, non-violent campus democracy in which healthy ideological debate and competition can take place.
Issued by:
Information secretary
Awami Workers party