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Mohammad Shehzad in Islamabad
The Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal has decided to ban cable television networks in the North West Frontier Province in Pakistan to please its voters and keep the pledge made during the election campaign.
MMA leader Professor Muhammad Ibrahim, provincial chief of Jamaat-e-Islami, told a local paper in Peshawar that the MMA had vowed to cleanse the country of 'obscenity and vulgarity' and therefore decided to ban cable TV.
Ibrahim condemned television, cable, VCRs, and cinema as the hub of social decadence. "Our people are against these inventions, which are Western creations," he said. "The MMA will introduce total Islamisation in the North West Frontier Province. We have a full mandate to Islamise the system in this province."
But experts seriously doubt the MMA's claim to Islamise the entire state, particularly on issues such as bank 'interest'. The MMA, in their opinion, is resorting to hollow rhetoric to appease its voters.
Under Islamic laws, even smoking is forbidden. Would the MMA then ban cigarettes, they ask.
The alliance is following in the footsteps of the Taliban, which will lead it to grave danger, they said. It will find it very hard to address certain economic "conundrums".
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