HAH Report
The Awami Workers Party President Fanoos Gujjar died of cardiac arrest on Saturday. He was 63. His funeral rites will be held at his native village Riyal, Batala Union Council, Buner District at 3pm on Sunday, said a statement issued by the party leadership.
The party has announced to observe three-day mourning on the death of the veteran leftist leader.
“Comrade Fanoos’s death is a great loss to the progressive forces, workers, peasants in general, and AWP in particular,” said Abid Hassan Minto, Founding President, Yousaf Mastikhan, Senior vice-president, Akhtar Hussain, Secretary General, Ismat Shahjehan, Deputy Secretary-general and Farooq Tariq, Spokesperson.
“We have lost a great leader, a committed Marxist and friend of the working class, peasants, and oppressed people of Pakistan,” the statement said.
The AWP has expressed “profound grief and shock over the sudden demise of their comrade and expressed heartfelt condolence to his family, party workers and friends.
Fanoos was elected president of the left wing party in its second congress in 2016. Earlier he was elected chairman of the party in 2012 after the merger of three left-wing parties, and Abid Hassan Minto as its president.
Comrade Fanoos contested elections from his native constituency, Buner, in 2018.
The veteran leader remained committed to the cause of and struggled for the rights of the working class, oppressed nations and people and for building a real socialist alternative till the last breath of his life.
He spent four years in jail during military dictator Zia’s regime but never compromised on his ideology and principles.
The party leadership has pledged to continue his mission and struggle for bringing social change in the country and for setting up a classless society.