True Freedom Is Not Achieved Through a 21-Gun Salute but by Giving Rights and Protection to the Poor: Mahmood Khan Achakzai

QUETTA: Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) Chairman and opposition leader in the National Assembly Mahmood Khan Achakzai has said that true freedom cannot be achieved through ceremonial celebrations, flag-hoisting and a 21-gun salute, but by ensuring rights, justice, food and protection for ordinary citizens.

In a video message posted on his social media account on the occasion of August 14, Achakzai said Independence Day had been celebrated for decades with gun salutes, military parades and flag-hoisting, but the real meaning of freedom went far beyond such ceremonies.

He said that if building roads, drains and canals alone constituted good governance, the British rulers had also built such infrastructure during their rule. He referred to institutions, barrages, police and judicial systems established during the colonial period, arguing that the struggle for independence was fundamentally about securing the right of the people to govern themselves.

Achakzai said the independence movement was not launched simply because the people disliked the British or their religion. Rather, he said, the central objective was to obtain the right to self-government.

He argued that although political control was taken from the British, the country had unfortunately failed to fully transfer the right of governance to its people.

“True freedom,” he said, would come when the provinces and people of Pakistan were genuinely empowered and free.

Achakzai said Pakistan could not be strengthened merely through slogans and flag-hoisting. He argued that the country would truly prosper when ordinary people in Punjab were freed from hunger, when the people of Sindh benefited from their province’s coast and resources, and when the land and resources of the Saraiki region served its people.

He said injustice creates resentment and hatred, which can eventually lead to conflict and violence.

Highlighting the economic hardships faced by workers, Achakzai said a daily wage for labourers in areas such as Peshawar and Malakand remained around Rs700 and was not even available every day.

He contrasted the financial struggles of poor families with what he described as excessive spending by affluent sections of society, asking how a poor person with five or eight children could afford food, education and healthcare.

Achakzai said the existing system could not continue in its present form and emphasized that poor citizens were not demanding luxury from the government. Rather, they wanted security, dignity, justice and basic necessities.

He said an ordinary person wanted to be able to leave home without fear that someone would violate the security of his family or harass him on the way.

He argued that a government unable to protect the homes of poor citizens, provide justice or ensure access to food had no moral right to govern.

Achakzai called for a system in which the rights, dignity, security and welfare of ordinary citizens were treated as the true measure of independence and governance.