Punjab Information Minister Azma Bokhari on Tuesday staged a walkout during a Punjab Assembly session in solidarity with journalists who have been boycotting the provincial legislature over alleged “ill-treatment” during Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi’s visit to the assembly.

During his three-day visit to Lahore over the weekend, the KP chief minister had given an address at the Punjab Assembly to opposition MPAs last week. However, the visit was marred by altercations between members of his entourage and security officials, while heated exchanges between PTI leaders and journalists were also witnessed.

Speaking during the session today, Bokhari staged a walkout to show solidarity with journalists from the Punjab Assembly’s press gallery, who she said were “beaten and pushed around” by people accompanying the KP CM.

During yesterday’s assembly session, a statement by opposition member Col. (retd) Shoaib Amir about the press gallery, calling them “sellouts”, also sparked outrage.

“The whole world witnessed the spectacle in the assembly on the arrival of the KP CM,” she said, adding that preparations had been made for the chief minister’s arrival.

However, she claimed that the KP CM “brought unauthorised persons with him, who claimed to be journalists”.

She alleged that they beat up journalists from the press gallery and misbehaved with them.

“The footage is available in the assembly’s records,” she added.

She further said that rather than apologising, the opposition doubled down on their conduct.

“I was accused of planting journalists during the KP CM’s visit,” she said, questioning if it was wrong to ask the KP CM “how he was finding his Lahore visit”.

“I was told that I had paid my employees to pose as journalists,” she said, vowing that she intended to send a defamation notice.

“In solidarity with what happened with Punjab‘s journalists and with the members of the press gallery, I’m staging a walkout,” the minister said.

On Monday, Punjab Assembly Speaker Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan had announced that an inquiry conducted into the chaos that marred the arrival of KP CM to the provincial legislature’s building would be sent to the law enforcement agencies.

Same day, chief minister Afridi, in a letter to Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, expressed “deep concern” at the treatment meted out to him during his Lahore visit, stating it was marked by “discourtesy and unnecessary hostility”.