PMLN Senior Vice-President Maryam Nawaz address supporters at Khudian
Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) Senior Vice-President Maryam Nawaz on Wednesday advised the “facilitators” of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan to stop helping him, as he has a habit of “letting down” his helpers.
Addressing a rally of thousands at Khudian, the hometown of PMLN stalwart Malik Mohammad Khan, she stressed that the “facilitators” of the ousted prime minister had been unmasked. Lamenting that Khan often talked about the supremacy of law in public speeches while avoiding courts and mocking the law in his personal capacity, she alleged that former chief justice Saqib Nisar and Justice (retd.) Asif Saeed Khosa had plotted to oust her father, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, and “install” Khan as prime minister.
Maintaining that new evidence—a reference to interviews attributed to former Army chief Gen. (retd.) Qamar Javed Bajwa and various audio leaks—suggested that Nawaz Sharif had been punished solely to bring Khan into power, she alleged that Supreme Court Justice Mazahar Ali Naqvi was one of Khan’s facilitators. She also questioned the legal justification for ongoing delays to the case against Shaukat Siddiqi, noting that he had been “used” against the PMLN to support the PTI.
Referring to the Supreme Court ruling that had directed the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to conduct elections in Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa within 90 days of their assemblies’ dissolution—“with the barest minimum deviation”—she claimed the nation was being “cheated” by declaring a 4-3 verdict as 3-2 to support Khan.
Stressing that the PMLN believed in free and fair elections, she said the next general elections should be conducted only after examining how Hamza Shehbaz had been ousted as chief minister of Punjab through a “flawed” judgment that was still being criticized by legal experts.
Directly addressing Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, Maryam regretted that the line of people seeking justice in courts was longer than the queues waiting for free flour. “The government has Rs. 20 billion to hold general elections, but it does not have Rs. 60 billion for conducting elections thrice,” she said, referring to remarks attributed to the CJP in which he had questioned the lack of funds for conducting timely polls.
Reiterating that there was no guarantee that Imran Khan would accept election results if he lost, she said there was also no guarantee that he would not dissolve assemblies on a whim if he returned to power. Alleging that Khan had used the Gilgit-Baltistan police to attack the Punjab police in Lahore, she slammed the PTI chief for asking children in Pakistan to lay down their lives for him while keeping his own children safe in England.
“A donkey was transformed into a zebra by drawing stripes on it by the facilitators,” she added.