Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah on Thursday said that if Punjab Assembly members were sensible and their “conscience was alive”, they would never vote for PML-Q leader Pervaiz Elahi in the chief minister’s election on Friday.
After the Punjab by-polls on 20 PA seats, Elahi and incumbent CM Hamza Shehbaz are now competing for the run-off chief minister elections scheduled today (July 22).
While Elahi appears to be the favourite, Sanaullah, in a press conference held, said “the PML-N believes that he (Elahi) doesn’t deserve to be appointed the chief executive of the province.”
Elahi recently alleged that PML-N was threatening to make members belonging to the PTI and its allies “disappear” ahead of the election.
Sanaullah indicated that any of the MPAs not showing up for the elections would be due to “Elahi’s incompetence”. “He is the same man who was once called a biggest dacoit of Punjab by Imran Khan.
“In Elahi’s eyes, the value of the assembly is such that he has said he won’t think twice if Imran Khan asks him to dissolve the assemblies,” the PML-N leader said.
“This matter is being discussed among the MPAs and it is possible that not just five but 50 members, on the basis of their political awareness, would either vote against him or stay [away].”
The minister rejected the PTI’s claims that PML-N was “buying” its party members. “We were never involved in such politics and would never indulge in it in the future.”
