MANSEHRA: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz vice-president Sardar Mohammad Yusuf on Wednesday said the party’s election campaign in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would be launched by its supremo and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif next Monday.

He told a public meeting here that Mr Sharif became the prime ministerfor the third time after launching the party’s election campaign in Mansehra in 2013 and he would assume the office another time as the representative of the district in the National Assembly.

The PML-N leader insisted that the last federal government of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf pushed the country into an economic mess that caused the threat of its bankruptcy.

He said that the PML-N-led government laid the foundation of the Hazara Electric Supply Company that would employ over 6,000 people from across the Hazara Division.

Safdar claims PML-N supremo to become PM yet again

“Our [PM Shahbaz Sharif’s] government inaugurated the project of 765kv grid stationin Sawan Mera. It is the largest facility in the country that will link Dasu hydropower initiative with the national power grid,” he said.

Mr Yusuf said the PML-N government launched the Hazara Motorway project and supplied gas to Balakot, Oghi and Garhi Habibullah areas.

He said that during his party’s government, Rs2 billion worth of funds were allocated for the establishment of hostels and residential and construction projects in the Hazara University and Rs18 billion funding for the gravity water supply scheme in the region,” he said.

PML-N leader retired Captain Mohammad Safdar, who was also in attendance, said that almost all political parties fielded election candidates against Mr Sharif in NA-15 Mansehra-II constituency but the latter would defeat them by a big margin.

“Fourteen candidates will challenge our leader in Feb 8 elections but poll results will shock them by declaring him the winner,” he said.

Former MNA Mohammad Sajjad and PML-N candidates Junaid Qasim, Sardar Zahoor and Sardar Shahjehan, and party leaders Arif Qalandar and Naeem Sakhi also addressed the gathering.

Meanwhile, provincial deputy emir of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl Hidayatullah Shah on Wednesday claimed that his party would win the Feb 8 elections in Hazara Division with a thumping majority.

“We have fielded the strongest candidates in the electoral arena in eight districts of Hazara Division,” Mr Shah told the JUI-F’s meeting in Oghi tehsil.

The JUI-F leader said his party emerged as the largest in the last local body elections in the province and would sweep the next polls as well.

He said the JUI-F was the only political party with the capacity to steer the country out of the current political and economic crises.

Mr Shah said his party had fielded candidates in Mansehra, Torghar, Kohistan, Battagram Kolai-Palas, Abbottabad and Haripur districts.

Published in Dawn, January 18th, 2024