The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) filed an appeal with the Supreme Court (SC) on Friday against the Lahore High Court’s (LHC) decision to exclude the votes of 25 PTI MPAs from the recount of MPA votes in the Punjab Assembly for the election of the Punjab chief minister.
The PTI pleaded with the apex court to accept its appeal against the LHC’s decision. “The PTI assembly members must be given adequate time to attend the assembly session,” it demanded.
“Hamza Shehbaz should be removed from the office so that a clean and transparent election could be held. The election of Punjab Chief Minister should be stopped till decision on the petition [appeal],” it added.
“Punjab Chief Minister Hamza Shehbaz Sharif’s notification of success should be suspended. The election of Chief Minister in Punjab Assembly should be suspended immediately,” it demanded further.
“A suitable time should be given to convening the assembly session by changing the decision of the high court. The parties in the case have the constitutional right to clean and transparent elections,” it added.
It should be noted that the PTI lawyers Faisal Chaudhry and Imtiaz Siddiqui filed the appeal and asked the court to hear it today.
The LHC had earlier on Thursday invalidated the oath taken by Punjab Chief Minister Hamza Shehbaz and ordered a recount of the votes cast in the April 16 election for the position of chief minister of Punjab. The LHC also ordered that the votes cast by 25 dissident PTI MPAs not be counted in the recount.
Fawad Chaudhry, a leader of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), commented on the LHC’s decision and claimed that it had exacerbated the political crisis in Punjab.
“Hamza’s government is gone, but this verdict will not end the crisis,” he had said in a tweet.
“There are many flaws in the decision. A meeting of the party’s legal meeting has been called. We will approach the Supreme Court regarding flaws in the high court’s decision,” he had added.
