Ajmal Baloch Warns Traders May Shut Down Islamabad, March on PM House
Ajmal Baloch Warns Traders May Shut Down Islamabad, March on PM House
The country’s most prominent trader body has issued a blunt ultimatum to the government: address traders’ demands, or face a capital-wide Islamabad shutdown and a march on the Prime Minister’s House.
All Pakistan Anjuman-e-Tajiran president Ajmal Baloch, speaking to reporters on Tuesday (October 6), accused the government of governing by force rather than planning, and said the trading community had been pushed to the wall over the past four years.
“Worse than the COVID period”
Baloch claimed that traders and the public had endured severe hardship in recent years, alleging that some 120 million people had fallen below the poverty line. In a striking remark, he said the current difficulties facing traders were worse than those of the COVID-19 pandemic period.
“I have never seen traders treated this way in my 28 years of experience,” he said.
He also took aim at restrictions on shopping bags, saying more than 100 cases had been registered against traders in a single day. If plastic bags are to be banned, he argued, the factories producing them should also be shut down and workable alternatives provided first.
The Islamabad shutdown threat
Trader leaders announced that protests would follow if their demands were not accepted, warning that Islamabad could be completely shut down, followed by a march toward the PM House. The Anjuman-e-Tajiran has called strikes in the capital before, and its warnings have historically carried weight with the authorities.
A final course of action — including the possibility of a full shutdown — is to be announced after a protest at Aabpara Chowk on Thursday.
Why it matters
An organised shutdown of the capital by the trading community would pile fresh pressure on a government already managing a protest march by the PTI, political deadlock and a fragile economy. Baloch’s warning puts the business community’s grievances squarely on the national agenda.
Who is Ajmal Baloch?
He is the president of the All Pakistan Anjuman-e-Tajiran, the country’s main traders’ association, and has led the community’s negotiations with successive governments for decades.
What are the traders demanding?
Relief from what they describe as anti-trader policies, an end to heavy-handed enforcement such as the shopping-bag crackdown, and alternatives before bans are imposed.
When will the final decision be announced?
After a protest at Aabpara Chowk in Islamabad on Thursday, trader leaders say they will announce their final course of action, which could include a complete shutdown of the capital.
