MANSEHRA: Special assistant to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief minister on information Barrister Mohammad Ali Saif on Friday said that Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervez Elahi was uncertain about his course of action after PTI chairman Imran Khan announced that his party would quit the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa assemblies.

“Pervez Elahi wants us [PTI] to dissolve the KP Assembly before he does away with the Punjab Assembly, but we think both should go together,” Mr Saif told reporters at the press club here.

He said that the final decision about the Punjab Assembly was to be taken by Mr Elahi.

Accompanied by local PTI leaders Kamal Saleem Swati and Dr Iftikhar Zaidi, the CM’s aide said the PTI and its allies were considering whether to dissolve KP and Punjab assemblies together or separately.

He said that Mr Imran had formed a committee with representation of KP and Punjab to decide when and how to dissolves assemblies.

“The committee led by our leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi will meet in Lahore on Saturday to discuss the outcome of the dissolution of assemblies and if the move will force the imported [federal] government to announce early elections in the country,” he said.

Mr Saif said that he believed that if the PTI couldn’t force the federal government into holding early polls, then the dissolution of assemblies would be an exercise in futility.

He said that if the provincial assemblies were dissolved, the federal government was likely to move the Supreme Court for relief.

The CM’s aide said that there’s no hurdle to the KP Assembly’s dissolution and that the opposition’s no-trust motion against the chief minister would delay the proposed move a little.

FLOUR QUALITY: Food director Rehan Khattak has said that the government is committed to providing quality wheat flour to the people at the subsidised rate.

“We’re sincerely working for the resolution of the millers’ problems to ensure the supply of quality subsidised flour across the province,” Mr Khattak told the representatives of mills during a meeting here on Friday.

The visitors were led by mills association president Mohammad Bashir Awan.

Mr Khattak said that the traders, who had never been involved in hoarding and artificial inflation, were involved for subsidised flour sale.

He said that he had directed district food controllers and assistant food controllers to be courteous towards businessmen during surprise visits to their shops.

The director said that the food department rejected applications filed for subsidised flour dealership by the people with no business background as it wanted the initiative to go ahead without irregularities.

Published in Dawn, December 3rd, 2022