More rifts among PMLN ticket aspirants

LAHORE/ISLAMABAD: As the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) leadership is yet to announce the final list of its candidates for the general elections, more rifts among the party ticket aspirants have emerged.

In a recent development, PMLN ticket aspirant from NA-258 (Panjgur) Dr Muhammad Ayub Baloch has accused the party of taking away his ticket to give it to a local electable. Baloch made these allegations at a press conference here on Tuesday. He said the provincial leadership of PMLN Balochistan wanted to give the party ticket to a local leader who had no connection with the party. “Neither he joined the party nor he attended any party meeting whereas I attended all meetings of PMLN Parliamentary Board. When I gave the interview for NA-258 Panjgur, no candidate from the party was present for the same constituency,” he said.

Expressing faith in former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Baloch said he was a PhD and wanted to remove the darkness of disappointment from the people of Balochistan. He said when the party ticket was issued to him with the signature of the party president, he immediately started his election campaign and went door to door to meet the people who wanted to vote for him to get rid of the atrocities of Wadera Shahi.

He said the provincial leadership of Balochistan wanted to deprive him of the party ticket from NA-258 by forgery. He requested the party leadership to immediately intervene and solve this problem. He said Quaid Nawaz Sharif and Shehbaz Sharif had given tickets and he came all the way to Lahore to intimate the leadership about the problem, but he was not able to meet the leadership so far. “If you are well-wishers of Balochistan youth, solve this issue immediately,” he said.

Meanwhile, the candidates for the PMLN ticket from PP-171 (Lahore) came face-to-face. For PP-171, PMLN leader Khawaja Ahmed Hassan and Mian Sahib Ghani were aspirants of the party ticket and were both campaigning in the constituency. The party leadership will decide on the ticket of Khawaja Ahmad Hassan and Mian Sahib Ghani on January 10 (Wednesday), sources claimed.

When contacted, PMLN Secretary Information Marriyum Aurangzeb said so far no ticket was finalized for any constituency of Punjab as well as Lahore. She said the party would soon announce the final names.

Furthermore, a meeting of the core committee of PMLN Minority Wing of Punjab was held at the PMLN Central Secretariat in Model Town. Minority Wing officials and party ticketholders of PMLN across Punjab participated in the meeting.

Ticketholders for reserved seats for women across Punjab also attended the meeting. Chief Coordinator PMLN Minority Wing Raheela Khadim Hussain addressed the meeting and said that in the general elections, the Minority Wing had always expressed its love for Nawaz Sharif. She said till the elections, the number of organizing committee would be increased from 30,000 to 50,000.

Meanwhile, former Minister of State for Finance Dr. Aisha Ghaus Pasha’s name has not been included in the list of those who have been awarded tickets on women’s seats from the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz).

Sources confirmed to The News on Tuesday that Dr Aisha Ghaus Pasha did not apply for the ticket on women seats mainly because she had to struggle a lot to give her professional viewpoint during her stay in the office. Then as Minister of State for Finance she possessed divergent views from former minister for finance Ishaq Dar on the resumption of the stalled programme of the IMF from October 2022 to June 2023.

As a professional and technocrat, she had felt that there was no space for any advice on key economic issues. She had applied for a long leave and given an indication that she might not come back as MOS during her stay in the Q Block because of her personal engagements.

But finally, she had come back and convinced the-then PM for resuming the IMF programme after which both sides struck an agreement for signing of new short-term bailout package under $3 billion SBA program. It was Dr Aisha Ghaus Pasha who had pursued former prime minister Shehbaz Sharif for making a phone call to the IMF Managing Director and then scheduled their meeting on the sidelines of the flood donor pledges conference in Paris. When contacted, Aisha Ghaus Pasha refused to talk on the subject. Now, former SAPM on Finance, former bureaucrat Tariq Bajwa, is considered quite close to the PMLN and if the party managed to win the election, then he could be bestowed the key position, probably Adviser to PM on Finance in the upcoming setup at the federal level.