Despite being one of the few close aides of Nawaz Sharif, Gohar parted ways when he was jailed and exiled.
HARIPUR: Former national assembly speaker Gohar Ayub Khan and his son Omar Ayub have finalised a date to formally join the Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N).
Omar said on Tuesday that they would formally be announcing their move on December 27 at a press conference in Raiwand. He also said that Raja Faisal Zaman, the son of late Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) senior minister Raja Sikandar Zaman, would also be joining the PML-N.
Youngest son of Field Marshal Ayub Khan, Gohar won elections through the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) when the Islami Jamroohi Ittehad (IJI) came to power after controversial elections. Gohar, being a close associate of Nawaz Sharif, was then elected as the Speaker of the National Assembly.
From 1993-1997 he served as Deputy Opposition Leader during the second tenure of the late Benazir Bhutto-led PPP government. He was then appointed the foreign minister in Nawaz Sharif’s cabinet after the 1997 elections, but was removed from the position by General (Retd.) Pervez Musharraf in October 1999.
Despite being one of the few close aides of Nawaz Sharif, Gohar parted ways when he was jailed and exiled. He later joined the Pakistan Muslim League – Quaid (PML-Q) and fielded his son Omar on a PML-Q ticket in NA-19 Haripur as he did not have a bachelor’s degree at the time.
Omar, although a political novice, defeated Pir Sabir Shah, the sitting provincial president of PML-N with a heavy margin and was chosen as minister of state for finance in the cabinet of then-prime minister Shaukat Aziz. However, the changing political dynamics eventually cost Omar his family seat during the 2008 elections and he lost to PML-N candidate Sardar Mushtaq Khan with a margin of over 40,000 votes, coming third.
Both father and son continued to remain affiliated with the PML-Q that eventually divided into two more factions and being close relatives of the head of the PML-Q (Likeminded), Salim Saifullah Khan, jumped into his boat.
About three months ago, when the leadership of PML-Q (Likeminded) and PML-N agreed on a seat adjustment and announced Omar as joint candidate for the next elections, the sitting MNA Sardar Mushtaq said he would join the Pakistan Peoples Party instead.
This cleared obstacles that Omar and his father faced. They also convinced Nawaz Sharif to soften his stance on accepting those who left the party at earlier dates. Sources say that the PML-N chief had no other option but to accept Omar as he has no electable candidate for NA-19 after the defection of Sardar Mushtaq to PPP.
It has yet to be seen how effective Omar will prove for Nawaz Sharif as Dr Raja Amer Zaman, the elder son of late Raja Sikandar Zaman, is also considered as strong candidate from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.
Although it has yet to be seen if the PML-N can win the seats required for forming the next government, Nawaz Sharif’s ‘backtracking’ from his previous stand of not accepting those who had abandoned him indicates that he is to win maximum seats.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 26th, 2012.
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