By Staff Reporter
LAHORE: More than a year after the dissolution of the previous assembly, the newly elected members of the Punjab Assembly, the largest provincial legislature in Pakistan, took their oaths on Friday amid protests, delays, and scuffles.
The session, which was supposed to start at 10 a.m., began more than two hours late and was interrupted by Friday prayers. The outgoing speaker, Sibtain Khan, administered the oath to the lawmakers and congratulated them on their new roles.
Among the attendees were Maryam Nawaz, the daughter of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and the nominee of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) for the chief minister post, and Aamir Dogar, a leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), the party of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan.
This was the first time Nawaz, who is seen as a potential successor to her father, had been elected as a lawmaker. She faces several corruption cases and is out on bail.
The elections for the speaker and deputy speaker of the assembly will be held on Saturday through a secret ballot, according to the speaker’s secretary. The PML-N has fielded Malik Ahmad Khan and Malik Zaheer Iqbal Channer for the positions, while the Sindh Ittehad Council (SIC), a party now joined by PTI-backed independent candidates, has nominated Ahmad Khan Bhachar and Muhammad Moeenuddin Riaz Qureshi.
The PTI has also put forward Mian Aslam Iqbal for the chief minister slot.
The assembly session was marred by chaos and clashes, as supporters of different parties chanted slogans and exchanged heated words in the galleries and outside the building.
The PTI accused the police of blocking its lawmakers, who are now part of the SIC, from entering the assembly premises. Sheikh Imtiaz, a PTI leader, said he and his colleagues had to reach the assembly in “hiding”. The party also posted a message on social media platform X, alleging that the police were deployed to arrest its lawmakers.
Meanwhile, in Sindh province, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which has a two-thirds majority in the assembly, named Syed Murad Ali Shah, a former provincial chief minister and a graduate of NED University of Engineering and Technology, as its chief minister candidate.
The party also announced Syed Awais Shah and Naveed Anthony as its nominees for the speaker and deputy speaker posts, respectively. The first session of the Sindh Assembly is scheduled for Saturday.
Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, the chairman of the PPP and the son of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, addressed the party’s lawmakers at Bilawal House and urged them to be “hard on corruption” and “engage with opposition parties”.
The PPP has faced serious allegations of corruption and misgovernance during its three consecutive terms in the province.
“You have to be very strong and strict against corruption,” Bhutto-Zardari said. “You have to play your role in eradicating corruption. We need to make more efforts as resources are limited, and the problems faced by the people are huge. All the leaders and workers associated with PPP are like one family, and as long as we continue to move forward together, we will continue to succeed.”
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