Nationwide shutdown in Pakistan against high energy bills, taxes

Major business centers, markets and shopping centers remained shut across Pakistan on Wednesday in protest against high taxes and rising power tariffs.

Business and trade activities came to a standstill in all the major cities, including the capital Islamabad on the joint call of trader unions and Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the country's largest religious political parties.

Reports trickling from commercial capital Karachi, Lahore, textile hub Faisalabad, Quetta, Peshawar, Multan and several other cities suggested that the trade and business activities remained shut.

Footage aired on local broadcaster Geo News showed key commercial and business areas in these cities remained closed as traders took out rallies in several cities against heavy taxes and electricity bills.

"We have been left with no other option but to take to the streets against unjust taxes and power bills," Mahmood Hamid, a trader from Karachi, told Anadolu.

"We are unable to run our businesses due to increasing taxes and electricity bills," he added.

In Islamabad, hundreds of employees marched toward the parliament house to protest a government plan to permanently shut state-run utility stores across the country.

Police blocked the road that leads to the parliament by placing containers and barricades.

Terming the strike "successful", Hafiz Naeem-ur-Rehman, the head of the Jamaat-e-Islami, thanked traders and businessmen for responding to his party's call.

"If the government fails to listen to the public's genuine demands, we will have no option but to launch a long march toward Islamabad,” he said.

Inflating power bills have taken center stage in the country's politics in recent months amid escalating protests by traders and political parties.

The government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Jamaat-e-Islami earlier this month reached an agreement to reduce power prices following a weeks-long protest sit-in by the latter near Islamabad.

According to the agreement, the government should reduce the energy prices within the next 45 days.