By Staff Reporter
LAHORE: Punjab’s chief minister, Maryam Nawaz, has served a Rs5bn defamation notice on a federal minister from a coalition partner, accusing him of making baseless corruption allegations against her government in a television interview.
The notice, issued on Tuesday, names Chaudhry Salik Hussain, the minister for overseas Pakistanis and a leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q). It also names Naeem Ashraf Butt, a local television channel presenter who interviewed him, and the channel’s chairman. All three are given seven days to retract the remarks, publish an unconditional apology and remove or correct the relevant portions of the interview. Otherwise, the notice warns, legal proceedings will follow.
Salik has refused to back down.
On Wednesday, the Punjab government established a dedicated defamation litigation cell under the Advocate General, Zafarullah Khan. It will handle cases involving the provincial government, its departments and officials. The notification did not mention Mr Salik, but it came a day after the chief minister’s notice.
The dispute began with the interview, broadcast on ARY News on Monday. Salik praised the former Punjab chief minister Chaudhry Pervez Elahi and took a swipe at the present administration. He alleged that political considerations were increasingly shaping development priorities and the allocation of public funds, and that a disproportionate share of the province’s development budget was going to Lahore. He said he regularly heard complaints of corruption in Punjab.
He also questioned lavish government spending, particularly the use of official aircraft. Officials who fly on them, he said, should have to show the public benefit of their trips. He called for ministers, federal and provincial, to be empowered to do their jobs but also held answerable for their performance.
Maryam responded the next day at a ceremony in Attock, where she was distributing laptops and merit scholarships at COMSATS University.
“There is a federal minister … somebody sent me his statement about corruption in Punjab,” she told the gathering. “Today, I am sending him a defamation notice.”
She said she would not listen to “false allegations of corruption”. “If you have evidence, bring it forth — otherwise I will drag you to court,” she said. She also asked why he remained a minister in a government he considered corrupt.
The chief minister said the real source of Salik’s anger was neither corruption nor progress. A few days earlier she had replaced the deputy commissioner of Gujrat and Mr had wanted an officer of his own choosing. “I will not allow anyone to interfere in the will of the people,” she said.
Nawaz also took exception to his description of Elahi as the “best-ever chief minister” of Punjab. Gujrat, she said, was in a sorry state when she visited about two years ago during heavy rain. “My Land Cruiser was completely submerged,” she said, gesturing to her neck to show how high the water stood. “Now, when it rains, the rainwater doesn’t accumulate. That work was not done by the Chaudhrys.”
The notice, which the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) published on X, was issued through the Additional Advocate General Punjab, Ch Muhammad Nawaz. It says the office of chief minister carries “substantial” public responsibility and demands “the highest degree of integrity, credibility and public confidence”. Allegations of dishonesty broadcast to “millions of viewers”, it says, are therefore a serious matter.
It says Butt “introduced and led the discussion” on corruption, while Salik “proceeded to make sweeping and baseless allegations against the provincial administration”. The programme, it says, “provided a platform for the propagation of serious allegations without first identifying any verifiable material or establishing their factual foundation”.
It describes the remarks as more than “ordinary political criticism”, conveying “serious imputations” of widespread corruption. “The most alarming aspect of the aforesaid statements is the express admission that he possesses no evidence to substantiate the allegations,” it adds.
The notice holds Salik responsible for “false statements”, Butt for his editorial conduct and Iqbal for facilitating and broadcasting the allegations.
Salik was unmoved. Speaking to reporters, in remarks aired by another news channel, he said: “God save us from pride and arrogance.” Asked to provide evidence, he said: “Please go and listen to the interview again.” He rejected the suggestion that the row was meant to distract from the issue of new provinces.
“It was an interview, someone asked a question, and I responded honestly,” he said. “Yes, there definitely is [corruption].”
Nawaz replied: “So, levelling false accusations is considered humility, while offering a response is deemed arrogance? Bravo!”
Punjab’s information minister, Azma Bokhari, had earlier advised Salik not to “bite the hand that feeds him”. She also alleged that his displeasure stemmed from the rejection of his request for a deputy commissioner of his choice.
The row is politically awkward for the ruling alliance. Salik is the younger son of the PML-Q president, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain. His elder brother, Shafay Hussain, sits in Maryam’s provincial cabinet as minister for industries, commerce and investment.
The Chaudhry family’s loyalties have diverged sharply since Imran Khan’s government was ousted in a no-confidence vote in 2022. Elahi and his son Moonis Elahi, a former federal minister, aligned themselves with Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). The Shujaat branch stood with the Sharifs.
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