LAHORE: The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf central Punjab president Abdul Aleem Khan has said the Lahore constituencies, other than those won by the Sharif family, have been cut up like a cake in the new delimitation to the disadvantage of his party.
He said the NA-122 and NA-125 had been redesigned in a way that their major parts were included in four different National Assembly constituencies.
Speaking at a reception hosted for Senator-elect Chaudhry Sarwar at a local hotel on Wednesday, Mr Khan asserted that no tactic of the PML-N government would bear fruit, claiming the PTI would win in Lahore with a thumping majority.
Despite certain groupings within the party, he said all workers and leaders were united under the PTI banner.
He alleged the government exerted pressure on different PTI MPAs but failed to coerce them into voting for the ruling party candidates during the Senate poll.
Mr Khan said he would be holding consultations to select party candidates for the next general elections and take all recommendations to the parliamentary board.
PTI MPA Shoaib Siddiqui said the constituencies from NA-112 to NA-130 did exist in Lahore in one way or the other but the NA-122, where Aleem Khan and he himself had given tough time to the PML-N candidates, had been wiped out, by including its four parts in other constituencies.
Terming the practice pre-poll rigging, he said, the government had tried to undo the PTI’s massive work in the constituency. “The PTI will file an election petition over the delimitation of constituencies in Lahore,” he added.
Opposition Leader in the Punjab Assembly, Mian Mahmoodur Rasheed, said the PTI MPAs had faced worst kind of victimisation as none of its members were given even a single penny for development work in their constituencies. On the other hand, he said, even the defeated candidates of the PML-N were given billions of rupees during the last five years.
He said Shahbaz Sharif had asserted ahead of Senate polls that Chaudhry Sarwar should not win, while the PTI resolved that its candidate must win and the party’s unity succeeded. Stating that this all happened due to the right political decision of fielding Mr Sarwar.
Lauding party support led by Aleem Khan and Mahmoodur Rasheed, Chaudhry Sarwar said the PML-N was not celebrating its victory on 11 Senate seats in Punjab and instead worried about the only seat lost.
At another function, Sarwar stressed the need to change the Senate election method to eliminate horse-trading.
A large number of PTI leaders and its prospective candidates for the general election were present at the reception.
Published in Dawn, March 8th, 2018