Courts’ intervention in election affairs unjustified: Nawaz

LAHORE: PML-N Quaid Nawaz Sharif on Saturday said undue intervention of the courts into election affairs was uncalled for and could result in delay in the process which should be avoided at every cost.

He said this in a meeting of the party’s Federal Parliamentary Board. Party president Shahbaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz, President Lahore Pervez Malik, Former Federal Minister Saad Rafiq, Senator Pervaiz Rashid, Khurram Dastgir Khan, Chaudhry Sher Ali, Sanaullah Zehri, Rana Tanveer, Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, Begum Ishrat Ashraf, Saira Afzal Tarar and Senator Nuzhat Sadiq were attended the meeting.

Sources revealed that the meeting decided to summon the reports prepared by the divisional committees formed by the PML-N central leadership. These committees were formed to create a file regarding evaluation of every candidate that had applied for the party ticket.

According to the sources, the party top tier will scrutinise the reports of two divisions every day, starting from Sunday (today) after which the shortlisted candidates will be interviewed for the final decision.

The meeting also discussed the need to or not to formulate alliances with any political parties in the upcoming elections. However, no clear roadmap in this regard was finalised as it was the first meeting on the issue. Further deliberation on the matter was postponed till the next meeting of the board.

The participants also decided to appoint Marriyum Aurangzeb as the party spokesperson, as she was directed to move to Lahore from Islamabad in this regard.

The board also discussed the progress on the delimitation cases and other procedural complications and their probable affect on the election schedule. The PML-N leadership were of the view that they could be open to negotiation over reduced time for campaigning, but a delay in the elections would not be acceptable to the party.

Meanwhile, Punjab Governor Rafique Rajwana and PML-N Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter president Amir Muqam called on PML-N president Shahbaz Sharif separately.

They praised the vision of Shahbaz and said praiseworthy progress had been made in Lahore and whole of Punjab under him, adding, “’Punjab speed’ will soon transfer into ’Pakistan speed’.”

Effective measures had been taken to control law and order and speedy completion of mega projects shows extra talent of Shahbaz who worked day and night for the public welfare and service, they said.

“The development of Punjab had become a role model. The credit for development in Punjab goes to Shahbaz Sharif and his team,” they noted.

Speaking on the occasion, Shahbaz Sharif said the Punjab government has made new history of honesty, hard work and goodness. “We resolved the problems of the people considering them our own problems and worked day and night to resolve them and all mega projects have been completed at the top speed,” he said, adding that special attention has been paid to development of South Punjab and South Punjab has been given more funds in ratio to its population.

He said, “The people of South Punjab have trusted PML-N in the past and they will do so in the future.” The PML-N will go to the public for votes with raised head, he added. Shehbaz said elections should be held on time and in a transparent manner as Pakistan can be strengthened only through transparent polls.