PMLN finalises strategy for CM election

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) has finalised its strategy to counter Ch Pervaiz Elahi in the upcoming election of Punjab Chief Minister.

Party sources said PMLN, PPP and allied members of Punjab Assembly will stay in a private hotel near Lahore Airport till July 22. They have already started arriving in the hotel.The MPAs will ensure their presence in the hotel. They will go to the assembly from the hotel in the leadership of Hamza Shahbaz Sharif. Before leaving the hotel, Hamza Shahbaz will hold a meeting of assembly members. Fearing rioting in the assembly on the occasion of election of the Leader of the House, the PMLN members were directed to enter the House in groups.

Party sources revealed all the MPAs of PMLN and its coalition partners were directed to keep the atmosphere charged by shouting slogans against Imran Khan and Pervaiz Elahi, while the Deputy Speaker will provide security to the members.

Sources said PMLN may attempt to prevent the members of the current opposition alliance from reaching the House as it is a run-off election for the Leader of the House for which only members present in the hall will be counted. The party will try to create every possible hurdle in the election of Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi as Leader of the House.

After having a humiliating defeat in the recent by-elections, the PMLN top leadership, meanwhile, has decided to adopt an aggressive approach towards the opposition. Sources said there is a possibility that PMLN’s central Vice President Maryam Nawaz will be given important responsibilities to reorganise the party.

Maryam Nawaz will meet the workers and disgruntled members of the party to remove their grievances. The social media wing of PMLN will also be restructured, sources said.

They further said Maryam Nawaz will answer PTI’s Chairman Imran Khan in his own language. She will sit in the party’s Model Town office daily and monitor the party activities. Names of various PMLN members are under consideration to be included in a new political team for Maryum Nawaz, sources concluded.