A critical session of the Punjab Assembly, called to vote on the province’s next chief minister on Tuesday, has been postponed till April 16, a notification issued by the assembly secretariat said.
The notification said that PA Deputy Speaker Sardar Dost Muhammad Mazari shifted the assembly session to be conducted on the rescheduled date at 11:30am.
The session was initially set to be held on Wednesday (tomorrow) at 11:30am after Sunday’s session was adjourned without voting to elect a new leader of the house.
The provincial assembly had to elect the new leader of the house, with Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid’s and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-backed candidate Chaudhry Parvez Elahi and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s candidate Hamza Shehbaz vying for the position. Shehbaz had gained the support of the PTI dissident Jahangir Khan Tarin group.
The Punjab Assembly session occurred at the same time when a National Assembly session was held to vote on a no-trust motion against Prime Minister Imran Khan. Neither of the two votes took place as the NA Deputy Speaker Qasim Khan Suri dismissed the no-confidence motion, deeming it in contradiction of Article 5 of the constitution.
To be elected as chief minister, a candidate requires a minimum of at least 186 votes in the 371-member house. In the Punjab Assembly, PTI has 183 lawmakers, PML-Q has 10, PML-N with 165, PPP has seven, five are independent and one belongs to Rah-i-Haq.
