LAHORE: To bring forth the Punjab Assembly Deputy Speaker Dost Muhammad Mazari’s alleged links with the PML-N, the coalition partners — the PTI and the PML-Q — will be approaching the Lahore High Court again on Thursday (today).

The LHC on Wednesday directed deputy speaker Mazari to conduct the election for the slot of Punjab chief minister on April 16.

“We are going to challenge the court’s order about restoring the powers of the deputy speaker. Since the deputy speaker and his uncle, who is an elected MNA on the PTI ticket, are ‘covertly’ supporting the PML-N in the election of the chief minister, this is a perfect case of conflict of interest,” a senior PML-Q leader told Dawn on Wednesday.

Desiring anonymity, he said though the deputy speaker had been elected on a PTI ticket, his intentions to go out of the way to facilitate the PML-N and its candidate for CM office (Hamza Shehbaz) could not be ignored. The coalition parties have already filed a no-confidence motion against the deputy speaker, he added.

Coalition partners allege Mazari covertly backs PML-N hopeful for CM office

Some 25 PTI lawmakers belonging to the Tareen, Aleem and Asad Khokhar groups have openly declared their support for the PML-N and are currently staying with the PML-N and PPP MPAs in a hotel near the airport.

Former information minister Fayyazul Hassan Chohan, now a spokesman for Parvez Elahi, alleges that the PML-N leaders have detained the PTI MPAs in a hotel and are being shifted to different places after every few days “like horses and cattle”.

He says the MPAs who got elected on the PTI’s bat symbol will be required to vote for their candidate, urging the superior courts to take a suo motu action against the supposed trampling of Article 63-A.

Meanwhile, Mr Elahi in a meeting with the PTI and PML-Q lawmakers on Wednesday claimed he would win the election for the CM slot on April 16.

Expressing full confidence in him, his party MPAs vowed to make Mr Elahi successful.

Meanwhile, PML-N deputy secretary general Atta Ullah Tarar told a presser that after the court’s verdict the threat of suspension of any MPA in ‘damaging the assembly furniture matter’ was no more an issue.

“No MPA will be stopped from casting his/her vote in the chief minister’s election,” Tarar says, welcoming the LHC decision in this regard.

He says the Pildat and Fafen representatives should be allowed in the Punjab Assembly to monitor the CM’s election.

Tarar claims Mr Chohan wanted to join the PML-N, but the party refused to take him.

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2022