PHOTO: AFP/FILE
A district council member from JUI-F switched his party allegiance to PML-N and voted in favour of the budget that PML-N presented on Monday. However three members, including a woman councillor from JUI-F, joined PTI-led opposition, and boycotted the budget session of the district council.
This generated a stir within JUI-F in Mansehra as the party has only three seats in Mansehra district council and de-seating JUI-F’s Ghulam Rabbani would cost the party two seats. According to insiders, de-seating Rabbani will result in the party losing the JUI-F leader’s seat along with a women’s seat which is linked to it.
In the past
PML-N’s candidate Sardar Said Ghulam and QWP’s nominee Murtaza Tanoli were elected nazim and naib nazim of Mansehra Council, respectively, in August after JUI-F, JI and QWP decided to form an alliance with PML-N against PTI, which was in majority at that time.
However, PML-N managed to get support of six members of PTI’s forward bloc, appearing as a winner in the LG elections. PTI filed a reference against its six defectors under local government act. However, one of the defectors, who was elected to the minority seat, repented his decision publicly and rejoined PTI.
Ahmed Shehryar Khan, the leader of the forward bloc and nephew of PTI’s provincial leader Senator Azam Khan, resigned from the position. The rest of the four defectors were reinstated after Abbottabad bench of Peshawar High Court suspended the ECP’s decision to de-seat them.
With the high court’s decision, the PML-N-led district government heaved a sigh of relief as it managed to obtain the required majority in the house—43 out of 85 seats— and decided to call the budget session on December 21. However, before summoning the budget session by the convener, the JUI-F announced withdrawing its support to PML-N.
On December 21, when PMLN’s district nazim presented the budget for the year 2015-16, the JUIF’s member Rabbani voted in favour of the budget instead of joining his party in boycotting the session with PTI and PPP’s members of opposition.
Defector’s side
When contacted, Rabbani confirmed that he had voted for PML-N. He told The Express Tribune he joined JUI-F as it was an ally of PML-N. Now that JUI-F has revoked its party alliance, he wants to support PML-N.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 23rd, 2015.
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