Upping the ante, over 230 Opposition lawmakers have resigned from Pakistan’s National and Provincial Assemblies to resist President Pervez Musharraf’s re-election bid, as journalists observed a ‘Black Day’ on Sunday condemning the police action during protests against the General.

Eighty-four members of the National Assembly and 152 of four Provincial Assemblies from Opposition alliance All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) submitted their resignations to their respective party leaders, Raja Zafarul Haq, leader of Pakistan Muslim League-N, told reporters . APDM is headed by exiled former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s PML (N).

Haq said the resignations would be submitted to the Speaker of the National Assembly and respective Speakers of Provincial Assemblies on October 2, the day after Election Commission displays the final list of candidates for the October 6 presidential poll.

Journalists all over the country marched with black flags on Sunday to protest against the tear-gas and baton-charge on mediapersons covering the protests before the Election Commission here on Saturday during the scrutiny of nominations for presidential poll.

Sixty-four people were injured, including 13 police officials, 31 journalists, two opposition lawmakers and several passers-by in the clashes, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan news agency reported on Sunday.

The Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists decried the Government actions as “shameful”.

“What happened yesterday was shameful. It was the darkest day in Pakistan’s history,” Mushtaq Minhas, president of the Press Club here, said accusing the Government of increasing intolerance towards media.

About 400 journalists and human right activists chanted anti-government slogans and condemned police “brutality” as they marched from a press club in Islamabad to Parliament.

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