Captain (R) Muhammad Safdar, PML-N leader, has landed himself in the middle of a controversy after his speech against the Ahmadis in the National Assembly.

He accused the members of the community to be fighting against the country’s interest and called for action against them

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIWo3NbVE38

Ahmadis are already being persecuted and face severe difficulties due to the hatred against their belief system.

Statements like these only reinforce mob mentality and urge the masses to take action on their own, if they feel that the state is not doing anything.

He stated that Ahmadis should not be recruited in the army, and  even went on to point fingers at the Quaid-i-Azam University for renaming their physics department after the Nobel Laureate, Dr. Abdus Salam, because he belonged to the Ahmadi community.

People took to Twitter and Facebook to express their anger and frustration over his statements

They condemned the bigotry and hate-speech, and claimed to not support the party anymore.

https://twitter.com/EnyoAtHome/status/917680237881823232

Quaid-i-Azam University also issued a response to the statement of Captain Safdar, and took a firm stance on their decision to rename their department.

It is important to know why these statements were issued in the first place. A debate had been going on among the parliamentarians about the Khatam-e-Nabuwat clause in the Elections Reform Bill of 2017.

In the new form-A, the words “I solemnly swear” had been replaced with “I believe” in the section on Khatam-e-Nabuwat. This sparked a debate as to why these words were replaced, and it was established that it was a clerical error.

However, religious parties soon came forward with the claim that the error was intentional, and an attempt to push the narrative of the Ahmadi community. Captain Safdar also joined the bandwagon and bashed the authorities for a mere “clerical” mistake, to make himself more relevant in the current political situation.

While the replacement of these synonymous words should not have been an issue in the first place; if it had become one, it should have not have been taken advantage of

The election season is right around the corner. The results of the elections in NA-120 proved that extremist parties are gaining ground in Pakistan – a phenomenon which has not been witnessed for long in Pakistan. Keeping that in mind, the statement issued by Captain Safdar seems to be made in order to appease these parties for gaining ground in 2018.

However, no one should forget that this is hate speech and affects the lives of Pakistanis.