CHAKWAL: The PML-N leadership is struggling with taking a decision on the future of three of its MNAs who fielded their own candidates in the election for the posts of chairman and vice chairman for the Chakwal district council instead of voting for their party’s ticketholders.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had awarded the ticket for the district council chairman to Malik Mohammad Tariq Awan and that for the vice chairman to Chaudhry Khurshid Baig, both of whom were supported by Sardar Ghulam Abbas and Malik Saleem Iqbal.

A former district nazim and former provincial minister, Sardar Ghulam Abbas, remained the ruling party’s archrival throughout his political career and only joined the party in September this year. Malik Saleem Iqbal is a former provincial minister and is now serving as the adviser to Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif.

Of the nine parliamentarians from Chakwal, six had accepted the prime minister’s decision.

However, MNAs Tahir Iqbal and Sardar Mumtaz Tammam and MPA Zulfiqar Ali Khan rebelled against the party decision, formed their own group and fielded Malik Naeem Asghar, the younger brother of MNA Iqbal, for the slot of chairman and Yasir Aziz for vice chairman of the district council.

Though the party’s ticketholders won the Dec 22 elections by securing 55 votes when the rebel group had 32, the election confirmed that the anti-Sardar vote base in Chakwal district and particularly in NA-60 constituency has not decreased even after Sardar Ghulam Abbas joined the party.

“Politics in Chakwal, particularly in NA-60, has always been between the Sardar Ghulam group and the PML-N. Now that Mr Abbas has joined the party, the anti-Sardar group is still there and they will never accept him in the party,” says Younus Awan, a local journalist.

“The Sardar Ghulam Abbas group joined the PML-N with 29 union council seats and the party had to lose 32 seats as retaliation by three of its elected parliamentarians. The party leadership will have to think about whether it made a loss or profit by taking in Sardar Abbas,” Mr Awan added.

The party’s local leaders tried their best to resolve differences with the rebel MPs.

“Being the district president of the party, I tried to convince the three MPs to accept the party decision, but they did not agree. They are forgetting that they are in the assemblies due to the party,” said MPA Chaudhry Liaquat Ali Khan.

Mr Khan said the fate of these MPs will be decided by the party leadership.

Malik Saleem Iqbal also said the MPs have betrayed the party. “They violated the party discipline and the top leadership will now decide the fate of the rebels,” he said.

Sardar Ghulam Abbas, because of whom the party has divided in two in Chakwal, says he tried his best to reach out to party local leaders after he joined, except MPA Zulfiqar Ali Khan.

“I contacted Nasir Majeed, a cousin of MNA Iqbal and did not get a positive response,” he said, adding that he was taken into the party by Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif and that he came in with his 175,000 votes.

Though MNA Tahir Iqbal maintains that him and his friends did not rebel against the party, their actions did not sit well with other party leaders.

“Similar differences in a party are routine matters in local bodies’ polls. We are in the PML-N and will be,” Mr Iqbal told Dawn.

Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2016