After dramatic day, PML-Q’s votes rejected
LAHORE: After a dramatic day, PML-N’s candidate Hamza Shahbaz Friday retained the post of the Punjab chief minister against Punjab Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Pervez Elahi through a three-vote victory.
Following the counting of votes, Punjab Assembly Deputy Speaker Dost Mazari, citing Article 63A of the Constitution, rejected 10 votes cast by PML-Q members. As a result, Hamza received 179 votes, while Elahi managed to bag 176 votes.The Supreme Court of Pakistan, back in May, had ruled the votes of dissident members of the Parliament (MPs), cast against their parliamentary party’s directives, cannot be counted.
The apex court, issuing its verdict on the presidential reference seeking the interpretation of Article 63(A) of the Constitution related to defecting lawmakers of the PTI, said that the law cannot be interpreted in isolation.
During today’s ruling, Article 63(A) was applied after PML-Q President, Chaudhry Shujaat, wrote a letter to the deputy speaker, saying that he had directed the party not to vote in any party’s favour.
Following Mazari’s decision to disregard the 10 votes of PML-Q members a move that allowed Hamza to retain his post as the chief minister of Punjab PTI said that it would approach the country’s top court to challenge the decision.
In a major development ahead of the voting, PML-Q leader Moonis Elahi said that his uncle, senior party leader Chaudhry Shujaat, had refused to back Imran Khan’s candidate Elahi.
He said that he had gone to visit Shujaat but he refused to issue a video recording in this regard. “I have lost and Imran Khan has lost as well but Zardari has won,” Moonis quoted his uncle as saying. In response, former interior minister Sheikh Rasheed said that Elahi was the parliamentary leader of PML-Q.
“Chaudhry Shujaat had said twice or thrice before that he would back Elahi, but Asif Zardari has, once again, exposed himself.”
Later, while speaking to senior journalist Ansar Abbasi, Moonis said that Shujaat had written a letter to the deputy speaker, stating that no one from the party will be casting their votes.
“Asif Zardari had assured Shujaat that he would make Elahi the chief minister of Punjab,” Moonis said. “Zardari had also told him that Elahi would be the candidate for PML-N and allies.”
Moonis added that his party will only vote for Imran Khan’s candidate, adding that no one from his party will be casting a vote in favour of PML-N or its allies to become the next chief minister.
He also took to his Twitter account and shared with the masses that a day ago, PML parliamentary party, chaired by the parliamentary party leader in the provincial assembly Sajid Bhatti,
held its meeting and it was decided unanimously that Elahi would be the candidate for the CM’s slot. Following Shujaat’s announcement that the party will distance itself from voting for PTI’s candidate in the Punjab CM’s election, PML-Q workers, amid a heavy contingent of police personnel, staged a protest outside his Lahore residence.
The protesters held lotas — a symbol for turncoats — in their hands during the demonstration and chanted slogans in favour of Elahi.At the beginning of the session, PML-N objected to the presence of PTI candidates Zain Qureshi and Shabbir Gujjar in the assembly and said that since Zain had not resigned from the membership of the National Assembly, he was not eligible to vote in the provincial assembly. Meanwhile, the party added that since there was a case pending against Gujjar with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), he cannot cast his vote either.
However, PTI leader Raja Basharat, in Gujjar’s defence, said that the ECP had sent a notification in this regard and according to that, Gujjar is eligible to cast his vote.
Following that, Mazari rejected PML-N’s objections and said that both PTI candidates could cast their votes.