LAHORE: The Punjab Assembly will elect a new chief minister on April 3 (Sunday), according to the speaker of the house, who delayed the day’s proceedings on Saturday, which had been interrupted by sloganeering from both sides of the aisle.
Nomination papers must be filed by 5 p.m. today, and they will be scrutinised by 6 p.m., according to Punjab Assembly Secretary Muhammad Khan Bhatti.
The two aspirants for the coveted Punjab chief ministership, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) leader Chaudhry Pervez Elahi and Pakistan Muslim League-Hamza N’s Shehbaz Sharif, were optimistic throughout the session and both claimed to have the needed number of lawmakers on their sides.
Hamza claimed that the PML-N had more than enough votes to become the next chief executive of Pakistan’s most populous province, and that the current state of affairs in Punjab was the outcome of the ruling party’s policies.
Usman Buzdar, the now-former chief minister, shot down rumours that he had established a separate bloc after resigning.
They were with Prime Minister Imran Khan, he declared, and they will stay by his side. He also denounced the event in which Yasir Hamayun, the PTI’s former minister of higher education, misbehaved with a journalist.
Elahi had earlier in the day referred to the game as a ‘long inning,’ not a’short match.’
The Punjab Assembly speaker made the comments in response to a journalist’s question on how he was “getting ready to play cricket on a tough surface.”
Elahi merely answered that everything was good when asked about the number game in the province legislature to assure his victory as chief minister.
The PML-Q leader did not respond to more questions from the media, and he also did not respond to inquiries about his son, Minister for Water Resources Moonis Elahi.
Following Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Rana Sanaullah’s remarks, which held him responsible for the PML-Q’s decision to vote with the government rather than the opposition in the no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Imran Khan, the intrigue around his son has grown.
Meanwhile, the media boycotted the Punjab Assembly session on allegations that provincial minister Yasir Humayun of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf had humiliated him.
Despite being allowed to cover the session from the press gallery in the past, the media were prevented from entering the Punjab Assembly Secretariat.
Following his party’s decision to support the government coalition in the face of the no-trust move against the premier, Prime Minister Imran Khan offered Pervez Elahi the position of Punjab chief minister earlier this week.
Usman Buzdar, the former Punjab chief minister, presented his resignation to Prime Minister Imran after the combined opposition filed a no-trust resolution against him in the province parliament, alleging “poor performance.”
