LAHORE: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s son, Hamza Shehbaz, on Friday returned to the country amid apprehensions of his arrest after staying for nearly a month in London where his uncle PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif has been living in self-imposed exile since November 2019.

Only a few party workers reached Allama Iqbal International Airport to receive the former chief minister.

While maintaining a low profile, Hamza had left the country after his name was removed from the no-fly list by his party’s government in the Centre. Before the PML-N-led coalition government took over in April, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government had stopped him at the airport from leaving for the UK.

The PTI leadership alleged that “brutal action” against its party leaders and supporters during the party’s May 25 long march on Islamabad was unleashed by Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and the then chief minister of Punjab Hamza Shehbaz. While PTI-PML-Q coalition government in Punjab registered a case against interior minister Sanaullah under terrorism charges, and booked 13 PML-N MPAs for hooliganism in the Punjab Assembly, it has not nominated the ex-CM in the case.

Despite securing warrants for their alleged involvement in the violence in the Punjab Assembly during CM’s election on April 16, the Punjab police earlier failed to arrest a dozen of provincial lawmakers belonging to the PML-N who managed to flee to Islamabad, where their party is at the helm of affairs.

Some PTI leaders reportedly blamed the “poor strategy” of Punjab Home Minister Hashim Dogar for a botched operation to arrest the PML-N legislators.

Published in Dawn, September 3rd, 2022