Start campaigns for polls in Pakistan: Nawaz Sharif to party leaders

Lahore: The ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif has directed his party leaders to start a mass mobilisation campaign for the upcoming general elections.

The 73-year-old three-time former prime minister has asked the ruling party members to start preparing for the elections and confront the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party and its allies in public, The News International newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Nawaz left for London in November 2019 after the Lahore High Court granted him a four-week permission allowing him to go abroad for his treatment. But he never returned to Pakistan, where he was convicted of corruption and jailed. His party last month announced that it had started preparations for the return of its "self-exiled" supremo.

Quoting party sources, the paper said that Nawaz, in a series of online meetings with his party leaders, directed them to speed up their political activities before the vote of confidence in Punjab.

His younger brother and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was asked to engage with allies to find a solution to stop the opposition party from dissolving the Punjab Assembly.

Former prime minister Imran Khan has said that he would dissolve the assemblies in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces ruled by his party if the federal government, led by Prime Minister Shehbaz, did not sit down for talks and announce dates for the general elections.

The federal government -a coalition of several parties- is opposed to holding elections now. The term of the current National Assembly will end in August 2023.

Khan, the former cricketer-turned-politician, who was ousted as prime minister in April this year after a no-confidence motion was passed in the National Assembly, is seeking fresh general elections in Pakistan.

The Punjab governor, who belongs to the PML-N party, had taken steps to stop Khan from dissolving the Punjab assembly.

The upcoming session on January 9 is extremely important for both the PML-N party and the PTI party, as Punjab Chief Minister Parvez Elahi might take a vote of confidence, and in case the opposition alliance fails to attain the number of votes required in the no-confidence motion, then Khan’s announcement of the dissolution of the assemblies would be implemented, the paper added.