LAHORE: After the opposition lawmakers in Punjab were barred from entering the provincial assembly premises to hold the election of the chief minister, they executed their ‘plan B’ and moved to a hotel and held a mock PA session where they passed a resolution to elect PML-N’s Leader of the Opposition in Punjab Assembly Hamza Shehbaz as the new chief minister.

Videos were played all evening on TV channels, showing PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz and her cousin Hamza leading an army of around 199 MPAs aboard large buses, travelling to a hotel on Egerton Road from the one in Gulberg where they had been lodged for the past few days. During the journey, the lawmakers were seen taking selfies and making videos for their social media followers from inside the buses illuminated with pink and blue lights, reminiscent of school excursions.

On the way to the hotel, Ms Nawaz, sitting alongside Hamza, also spoke to her father, deposed premier Nawaz Sharif, in London on a video call, and told him about the party’s plan to elect the chief minister in a (mock) assembly session.

Maryam as well as PML-N leader Pervaiz Rashid attended the ‘session’ as guests.

The PML-N claimed that around 200 MPAs, including those from the Tareen, Aleem, Khokar groups of PTI, voted for the resolution. After the mock election, Maryam and Hamza shared an emotional embrace. She said she had tears of joy.

On the other hand, former federal minister Moonis Elahi of the PML-Q ‘felicitated’ Hamza by taking a jibe at him. “Hamza sb congratulations for becoming CM of Faletti’s Hotel,” Moonis tweeted. Moonis also told a private TV channel the PTI coalition had 189 lawmakers to support Parvez Elahi for the CM’s election.

Maryam’s presser

Later, addressing a press conference at the venue, Maryam said she wondered why Parvez Elahi had decided to side with Imran Khan who had abrogated the constitution. “I respect Parvez Elahi, but fail to understand why he chose to become a part of the defeated team,” she said and told Mr Khan he had lost the game.

She congratulated the defecting groups of the ruling PTI, led by Jahangir Tareen, Aleem Khan and Asad Khokhar, for supporting the opposition’s candidate for the CM. She claimed the PML-N’s mandate had been stolen in 2018 by Imran Khan, whom she called “the first civilian dictator who abrogated the constitution”.

Taking potshots at a friend of the first lady, Maryam said outgoing CM Usman Buzdar was a dummy as the real chief minister was Farah Gujjar who was the “front person” of Banigala.

Saad’s admission

Meanwhile, PML-N leader Khwaja Saad Rafique admitted that the opposition embraced the “sugar and land mafia” (apparently led by Jahangir Tareen and Aleem Khan) because it (opposition) wanted to complete the numbers in Punjab (to elect its chief minister). “The numbers for the election of the CM matter the most, which we managed,” he said in response to a journalists’ question here on Wednesday.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2022