PESHAWAR:
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday issued notices to the federal and provincial governments as well as the Election Commission of Pakistan, seeking their responses to a writ petition filed against frequent road closures caused by protests and long marches.
The petition was heard by a two-member bench comprising Justice Naeem Anwar and Justice Kamran Hayat Mian Khel.
During the hearing, the petitioner, Advocate Muhammad Hamdan, informed the court that the repeated blocking of roads in the name of protests and long marches had become a routine matter in Peshawar. He said the city already suffers from heavy traffic congestion, where a journey that should take 10 minutes often stretches to more than an hour.
He argued that recurring protests by political parties and employees had further aggravated public hardship. Road closures, he added, severely affect students and commuters, while patients travelling in ambulances often remain stranded for long periods due to blocked routes.
The petitioner maintained that political parties frequently use protests and long marches to achieve political objectives, causing undue suffering to the general public.
