PML-N tight-lipped on date for Nawaz’s return

Party leadership assessing political temperature

ISLAMABAD: The ruling PML-N remains coy on providing an exact date for the prime minister’s homecoming with the party leadership still in consultation over a possible schedule for Nawaz Sharif’s arrival in Islamabad.

On Saturday, Information Minister Pervaiz Rasheed officially announced that the premier would return after Eidul Fitr. But the minister stopped short of giving an exact date.



Nawaz travelled to London on May 22 to undergo an open-heart surgery. On May 31, he received four grafts. He was discharged from hospital seven days later but remains in London recuperating.

On Monday, Leader of the House in the Senate Raja Zafarul Haq said doctors would conduct a detailed medical examination of Nawaz on Monday or Tuesday to decide when he could fly home.

“It will take a couple of days before a definite date for the premier’s return is known,” he told The Express Tribune. “Hopefully, he will be here after Ramazan — immediately after Eid.”



Senior party sources told The Express Tribune that Nawaz was initially considering returning before Eid, but that plan was discarded soon after the PPP and PTI announced their plans.

“Mian [Nawaz] sahib landing here [Pakistan] in an atmosphere of hostility will have a mercurial impact on the existing political scenario,” said a confidante of the premier, while requesting anonymity.



“The PTI and PPP are engaged in their newly found political animosity against the prime minister. His arrival in such conditions would certainly charge the atmosphere,” he said.  “We want to play it cool even if it takes a while.”

Party sources believe that giving a definite date for Nawaz’s return will feed the political scenario prevailing in the country. “We can see an ever charged political front in the days to come — especially after Eid,” a source said, adding that “the party leadership is playing cautiously.”

Published in The Express Tribune, June 28^th, 2016.