Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) has secured the required majority in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Assembly to form its government for the third consecutive time in the province with the party’s provincial president, Ali Amin Gandapur, likely to become the chief minister.
The possibility of Gandapur becoming the Premier of the province has triggered severe backlash on social media.
On November 8, 2017, then PTI MNA Dawar Khan Kundi, wrote a letter to then-chairman PTI Imran Khan about an incident that took place in Dera Ismail Khan, the constituency of Ali Amin Gandapur.
A young orphan girl was stripped and then paraded naked in a Khyber Pakhtunkhwa village after her brother allegedly held a pre-marital affair with somebody. During the incident, nobody helped or sheltered the girl.
As per Dawar, the logistics and physical support to the criminals who stripped the young girl were all provided by PTI Minister Ali Amin Gandapur. In a letter written to PTI Chairman Imran Khan, Kundi wrote, “I visited the family a week before and they asked, in fact, requested, me to make sure that Ali Amin Gandapur, Revenue minister K-P, may be forced and asked to withdraw his support from the criminals,”
The letter further stated, “The notorious activities of Ali Amin Gandapur are a source of providing a bad name to the party as a whole,” Dawar wrote. “You must ask CM K-P Parvez Khattak to remove Gandapur from his ministerial portfolio and ask forgiveness from the bereaved family.”
Dawar Khan Kundi concluded his letter to Imran Khan by saying, “It is the time that PTI should stand with that orphan girl and provide justice to her as soon as possible.” However Ali Amin Gandapur has vowed he had nothing to do with the incident, saying that if charges of his involvement are proved, he was ready to be hanged till death.
Amid this, people are not happy with Ali Amin Gandapur being Chief Minister.
X (former Twitter) user @faraz_lhr wrote, “In 2017, Gundapur facilitated suspects involved in stripping a girl naked. Later a jirga forced the victim family to reconcile. Last month, the 5 suspects were shot dead.”
User Crucifiedrantsuser wrote, “If Ali Amin Gandapur can be CM KP than why not PMLN in Center. If it’s all about morals Then where are the morals. How pti will defend Ali Amin n we couldn’t defend pmln?What media sells isn’t right. For me media has no credibility after this. How they projected things is absurd.”
User @AmmarRashidT user wrote, “Can’t think of a better way to demonstrate you’re the non-dynastic non-traditional party that can deliver competent governance than by appointing a thuggish dynast with a disturbingly violent past to the most important position in the province you govern.”
User @vanillasky458 wrote, “Haven’t heard anything on this from a PTI official, but Gandapur should not be CM. PTI did not get go through this fight only to make mistakes we’ve called out other parties for. Hope Jhagra wins his seat, no better choice than him.”
