PESHAWAR: Jamaat-i-Islami chief and senior minister in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government Sirajul Haq on Saturday demanded the immediate lifting of curfew in Buner district of Malakand division.

The demand was made during anews conference at the JI provincial secretariat here, which was also addressed by Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf vice chairman Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi.

Mr Qureshi had visited Mr Haq to seek his party`s support for the constitution of an independent Election Commission.

PTI central general secretaryJehangir Tareen and JI parliamentary leader in the National Assembly Sahibzada Tariqullah were also in attendance.

JI is a major coalition partner of the ruling PTI in the province.

Asked why he didn`t ask Chief Minister Pervez Khattak to lift curfew from Buner, Mr Haq said he had discussed the issue with thechief minister but that was a fact that currently, the federal government controlled affairs in the province.

Under the law, the district administration has the authority to impose curfew in an area or lift it.

`Being a public representative, this is my responsibility to highlight the people`s problems and there-fore, I discussed the matter with (chief minister) Pervez Khattak, the JI chief said, adding that the people had been suffering from weeklong curfew in Buner.

He said the curfew was lifted from North Waziristan Agency on Friday and therefore, the government should follow suit in Buner, too.

Earlier, Mr Qureshi said JI supported the one-point PTI agenda regarding formation of an independent and powerful Election Commission. He said after garnering support of the opposition parties, PTI was likely to bring a `constitutional package` for the Election Commission reforms in parliament with consensus.

The PTI leader said JI had agreed to nominate two senior leaders for a multiparty committee to be tasked with making recommendations for reforms in the Election Commission.

`The multi-party committee comprising representatives of affected political parties will make recommendations,` he said.

Mr Qureshi said PTI would not take any step to undermine democratic dispensation in the country and that its objective was to form an independent and power Election Commission.

He said all political parties had expressed reserva-tions about the results of the last year`s general elections.

`In India, political parties have accepted election results and therefore, Pakistan, too, needs free, fair and transparent elections in future,` he said.

The PTI leader said JI wanted an autonomous Election Commission and fully supported Imran Khan`s one-point agenda for it.

On the occasion, Mr Haq said anything beyond the ambit of the Constitution was not acceptable and that his party would oppose any extra-constitutional step.

`We have no intention to topple the elected governments,` he said, adding that his party backed the PTI struggle for the formation of an independent Election Commission.

The JI chief said the country needed an Election Commission, which was free from the influence of the judiciary and the establishment.

He claimed that many candidates had violated the code of conduct in the last general elections but the then Election Commission didn`t act against them.