Four estranged PTI MPs may rejoin party today

Fawad says people will snub horse-trading in today’s gathering

ISLAMABAD:

 

Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry on Saturday hoped that four dissident PTI lawmakers would return to the party’s ranks on Sunday (today).

The minister was addressing the media in Islamabad, accompanied by Sindh Governor Imran Ismail and Maritime Affairs Minister Ali Haider Zaidi.

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“One of the MNAs has replied that he had not breached party discipline. The reply of another MNA is expected soon. [Planning and Development] Minister Asad Umar is meeting with him as we speak,” the minister added.

About the government’s allies, Fawad said discussions were held on Friday with the PML-Q and the process would continue on Saturday night.

On the no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Imran Khan, the minister claimed that the people would disagree with the opposition’s stance.

“Tomorrow [Sunday] in the historic gathering, the people would snub the corrupt practice of horse-trading,” he added.

“It is for the first time after Zulfikar Ali Bhutto that the foreign policy of Pakistan is free and the wheel of the economy is turning in the right direction. The people will make sure that the conspiracy against what PM Imran has achieved fails.”

He also urged the people participating in the rally to maintain discipline and follow the guidelines provided by the Supreme Court and Islamabad High Court.

“Everything should remain peaceful and no major causeways are to be blocked.”

Maritime Affairs Minister Zaidi, while addressing Sindh's chief of police, asked if he was the inspector general for the entire province or a “slave” of Bilawal House.

He claimed that he had reports that PPP MNA Jam Abdul Karim, booked for the murder of Nazim Jokhio, had returned to Pakistan while the Sindh IG was ‘asleep’.

A day earlier, a two-member bench of the Sindh High Court had granted 10-day protective bail to the lawmaker.

Read No-confidence vote likely to be held on April 3 or 4: Rashid

The MNA, along with his brother MPA Jam Awais and others, had been booked for torturing Jokhio to death as he had tried to prevent his foreign guests from hunting the endangered houbara bustard.

Minister Zaidi blamed the Sindh IG’s performance for whatever was happening in the province today.

“It is in your tenure that about 50,000 incidents of street crime occurred in just two months. You do nothing about it, but when our activists stage a peaceful protest, the Sindh police register FIRs of kidnapping and trespassing.”

Zaidi further asked the Sindh IG as to what kind of a legacy would he leave behind after he retired from the police force.

“You do not know that a murderer has returned? Are you sleeping all the time? I demand of the IG to leave a better legacy and take back the FIRs that are registered against the PTI activists. We are peaceful people, but do not force our hand to hold a sit-in outside someone’s house,” the minister warned.

Governor Ismail said a meeting of the party’s core committee was held earlier in the day during which PM Imran had wholeheartedly shared his views.

“All the members of the committee agreed with the premier’s views. PM Imran would show his trump card to the people soon,” the governor added, referring to the prime minister’s recent statement that he still had a move to ensure the failure of the opposition’s no-confidence motion.

On the murder of Jokhio, Governor Ismail said that he had written a letter to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to arrest MNA Jam Karim when he returned to Pakistan from Dubai.

“I have information that he [Jam Karim] is about to return to Pakistan. When courts call them they fall ill and go abroad but when there is horse-trading, they return. He would be dealt with according to law and the Constitution.”