In an apparent reference to the PTI, PML-N Chief Organiser Maryam Nawaz on Monday said a “terrorist party” could not be allotted an electoral symbol as her party kicked off its poll campaign in Okara.

After much delay, the PML-N is finally set to unveil its manifesto for the February 8 general elections. For the last two months, the party’s over 30 different sub-committees have been sitting together to prepare its poll manifesto.

PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif had been perturbed by his party being labelled as the ‘favourite’ of the establishment, an impression he desperately wanted to dispel during the election campaign, an insider had told Dawn earlier.

Further, the delay in the launch of the polls campaign was primarily caused by the PML-N’s long deliberations in ticket distribution and seat adjustment with the Istehkam-i-Pakistan Party (IPP) and PML-Q.

Addressing party supporters in Okara today, Maryam — without mentioning the PTI — said: “Sher [tiger] can be allotted sher, but a terrorist party cannot be allotted an election symbol like other political parties.”

“You say your electoral symbol was ‘bat’, no, it was the danda [baton] that you had in your hand. The danda that you used against the state of Pakistan and the public,” Maryam claimed.

Her remarks come just days after the PTI was stripped of its iconic electoral symbol ‘bat’. After marathon hearings over the weekend, the Supreme Court had on Saturday upheld the Election Commission of Pakistan’s decision to revoke the party’s electoral symbol and reject its internal election just a few days before polls.

“Today, what is happening to the PTI is a result of their own actions,” Maryam said of the recent “hue and cry” over the electoral symbol.

“There was a danda, not a bat, in your hands and the entire nation saw how you attacked military installations […] now say, what is your electoral symbol? It should have been the watch that you stole or the petrol bomb that you used against the police,” she claimed.

The PML-N leader asserted that the nation would not allow a political party to manipulate its internal elections and “escape without any consequences”.

“It is not his fault, he was used to being a ladla [blue-eyed],” Maryam claimed, referring to Imran Khan. However, she did not take any names. “He was used to getting bails […] he was used to facilitation. But neither the facilitation nor the facilitators remain,” she alleged.

Those times are over, Maryam warned, adding that now only the law and nation would take the final decisions.

Referring to Imran’s recent accusations that Nawaz was playing the match “with the umpires of choice”, Maryam said Nawaz’s “real umpire” was the public and it would bring him back to power again.

“If a person loves Pakistan […] then they would not vote for anyone except Nawaz Sharif,” she stated, promising good education, cheap electricity, women empowerment and a better living standard if the PML-N emerged victorious in the upcoming polls.

At the outset of her address, Maryam said the PML-N did not wish to take revenge. “The court of fate has taken a suo motu of Nawaz’s oppression […] when a person is truthful and honest like Nawaz, they stand like a lion whatever may come,” she added.

Maryam also promised that, unlike other political parties, the PML-N would not just work before elections but also after them.