Lahore: Rwadari Tehreek-Pakistan organized Minorities Convention at Lahore Press Club on February 01, 2024 to express their dissatisfaction and concerns on the undemocratic, unfair and unjust system of representation of minorities on reserved seats and to demand urgent reforms to ensure that the democratic rights of the citizens belonging to minorities are respected and they are awarded their right to elect their representatives of own choice democratically. 

Minorities Convention was chaired by Prominent Human Rights Defender Ms. Saeeda Diep while the speakers included Chairman Rwadari Tehreek Pakistan Mr. Samson Salamat, Former Provincial Minister for Human Rights & Minorities Affairs Mr. Ijaz Alam Augustine, Former Member Punjab Assembly Mr. Tahir Naveed Chaudhary, Chairman Minorities Alliance Pakistan Akmal Bhatti Advocate, National Assembly Candidate of Hakook-e-Khalq Party Muzamil Khan Kakar, Former Member Punjab Assembly Saadia Sohail Rana, Deputy Information Secretary of Pakistan People Party Saleem Bhatti and Shoaib Nabi Gill of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.    

The participants of the minorities’ convention unanimously declared and demanded that

a)    Other than the beneficiaries of the current “Selection System” the minority voters are unhappy, dissatisfied and have reservations over the current system to fill-up the reserved seats for the minorities.

b)    This system practically takes away the democratic powers and rights from the voters to elect their minority parliamentarians and instead power remains with the political parties and political elite without following any fair process, procedure or merit. As a result, the parliamentarians on minority seats follow their party lines rather than the minority issues which outrage the minority communities as their issues remain unheard in the parliament.  

c)    The system of Joint electorate should continue to maintain the political interaction of the voters belonging to different faiths and religions.

d)      The procedure to fill-up the seats for minorities should be reformed and the government, political parties and other stake-holders should work on a scheme which empowers and involves the minority voters to elect their representatives in the national, provincial assemblies and even at the local bodies’ tiers.

e)      Rwadari Tehreek Pakistan suggests that in order to fill the reserved seats for minorities separate constituencies should be declared and minority members of the parliament should be elected through direct elections constituency or division wise with the vote of minority voters.