No restriction on convicted person holding party position: Maryam responds to ECP

'Such laws were made during dictatorship rule to bar nomination of public representatives'

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Tuesday, in a written reply to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), stated that there is no restriction in the Consitution and the Election Act barring a convicted individual from holding a party post.

The reply further stated that "such laws were made during dictatorships to bar the nomination of the public representatives".

"There was a clause in Political Parties Order 2002, according to which a sentenced man cannot hold a party position. The parliament had abolished this clause in Election Act 2017," she added.

A three-member bench headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sardar Muhammad Raza is hearing the petition filed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in Islamabad.

The petition against Maryam was filed by PTI MNAs Maleeka Bukhari, Farrukh Habib and Javeria Zafar on May 9.



The petition says her May 4 appointment as PML-N vice-president is against the law because she has been convicted of a crime. She was sentenced to seven years in prison for abetting her father Nawaz Sharif after she was found “instrumental in concealment of the properties of her father” by an accountability court in July 2018.

The application stated that Maryam’s appointment as the party’s vice-president was in violation of the Constitution because she was disqualified and can’t hold any political or public office.