NA will elect new Leader of the House today
Ijaz Kakakhel Islamabad
The nomination papers of joint opposition’s candidate Shehbaz Sharif and PTI’s Shah Mahmood Qureshi were approved for the prime minister’s election scheduled for today (Monday).
The nomination papers of Shehbaz Sharif have been accepted after objections raised by the PTI were rejected. PTI candidate Shah Mahmood Qureshi, too, had his nomination papers accepted. Babar Awan, former SAPM on parliamentary affairs, had challenged Shehbaz Sharif’s candidature saying that the PML-N president faced several court cases.
As the scrutiny of nomination papers was being carried out, both Awan and Qureshi ran into a heated exchange with the NA secretary over Shehbaz’s nomination and when the secretary tried to explain a rule Qureshi repeatedly shouted, “This is not your job!” Awan said the constitution requires a candidate to be honest, but Shehbaz faced several cases.
PML-N’s Shahid Khaqan said that the secretary had allowed extra time to enable the PTI leaders to challenge the nomination. He also said that only the speaker could hear the objections. Qureshi reacted by saying that PML-N had resorted to rigging though it was yet to take power.
Shah Mahmood Qureshi submitted four forms with the NA Secretariat, while PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif, the joint opposition’s candidate for the post, filed 13 forms.
During the submission of nomination papers, Shah Mahmood and Ahsan Iqbal had a bitter exchange. Ahsan Iqbal told the PTI leader that “you are no longer the foreign minister”.
In reply to Ahsan Iqbal, Shah Mahmood Qureshi said that you are addicted to power, you are not a candidate, please get out of the room.
Earlier, PTI’s Kanwal Shauzab and Zain Qureshi arrived at Parliament House to collect nomination papers on Qureshi’s behalf. Speaking to the media, Shauzab said that the papers would be submitted after consulting with the party’s core committee.
The NA Secretariat had initially announced that 2pm would be the deadline for submitting the nomination papers for the election of the prime minister and the leader of the house while the scrutiny process would begin at 3pm.
Earlier, the secretariat had issued a statement delaying the timing but later took it back after the opposition opposed it. According to the secretariat, the PTI had requested to delay the timings.
The NA will meet today (Monday) at 2:00pm to elect the new prime minister after PTI Chairman Imran Khan was ousted from power through a no-confidence motion filed against him by the opposition.
Those propsed and seconded to the nomination of Shehbaz Sharif included Ayaz Sadiq, Khawaja Saad Rafique, Asif Zardari, Bilawal Bhutto, Azam Khan Hoti, Shahzain Bugti, Khursheed Shah, Syed Naveed Qamar, Khawaja Asif, Rana Tanvir Hussain, Maulana Asad Mehmood, Shahida Akhtar Ali, Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, Syed Ameen ul Haq, Akhtar Mengal, Agha Hassan Baloch, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Marriyum Aurangzeb, Khalid Hussain Magsi and Muhammad Israr Tareen.
Earlier, the decision to nominate Shah Mahmood Qureshi as the candidate for the prime ministerial slot from PTI was taken by a meeting of the party’s core committee headed by Imran Khan. Shah Mahmood Qureshi’s nomination was proposed by Amir Dogar and seconded by Maleeka Bokhari.
