Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Farrukh Habib on Saturday said that political rival, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had lost the political battle and was left with no option to save its Punjab government led by Hamza Shehbaz.
“Nobody is ready to defend the illegal and unconstitutional ruling of the deputy speaker,” he said while talking to the media outside the Supreme Court’s Lahore Registry.
The PTI leader was referring to the apex court’s short order issued earlier in the day, wherein the top court suspended the Punjab Assembly deputy speaker’s ruling and restrained Hamza to exercise absolute powers and serve only as a “trustee” chief minister until the hearing resumes in Islamabad tomorrow (Monday).
The ruling came a day after the PML-N won a dramatic victory against the PTI that few had predicted in the Punjab chief minister’s election, retaining the throne of Punjab after surviving a brush with loss in the country’s political heartland.
Farrukh, in his media interaction, said the deputy speaker’s ruling was not in line with the Supreme Court verdict on Article 63-A related to the defection clause and added that only parliamentary head of the party had the right to issue directions to lawmakers. He said the apex court with an “open heart” allowed CM Hamza to serve as the ‘trustee’ chief executive of the province; otherwise, in reality, “he is the fake chief minister”. “All eyes are on the Supreme Court. We are hopeful that Parvez Elahi will be the chief minister of Punjab,” he added.
He also took a jibe at the former president Asif Ali Zardari, who played a key role in winning Chaudhry Shujaat’s support for the PML-N, saying he is only “bhaari (heavy) on thieves and robbers, not on people”.
Meanwhile, former information minister Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said that the country had been reeling under political crisis due to “unnecessary adventure of the establishment”. Talking to the media in Lahore, he asked the powerful quarters not to “play” with Pakistan as the country was suffering due to political and economic instability. “How did Chaudhary Shujaat’s letter land in the deputy speaker’s pocket,” Fawad wondered, adding that the Mazari should be summoned in court for contempt.
