Criticising the recent Supreme Court judgment that barred Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) candidates from contesting election with party electoral symbol, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif Monday said, "They cannot eliminate us by snatching our election symbol." Talking to media persons outside the Accountability Court, Sharif said that his party symbol has been snatched due to which their senators had contested election without party's electoral symbol.
"Our lawmakers suffered difficulty while recognizing their party candidates in Senate elections since they were contesting as independent candidates without party symbol," he said Similarly during by-election in Sargodha held on March 4 (Sunday), Sharif said, his party electoral symbol "lion" was snatched from the PML-N candidate, adding that he was awarded another symbol 'pickup.' "Despite contesting with another symbol, our candidate won election with over 20,000 votes," he added.
"Can they eliminate us by snatching our electoral symbol from us? The elections' results should be as an eye-opener because more injustice they mete out, the bigger the public reaction will be and more people will support PML-N," he said, adding that the people have become aware now and feel that the PML-N's stance and narrative is correct. To a question regarding rigging in the Senate elections, he said that buying of votes should be investigated. This important issue should not be left unattended and it is mandatory to reach the bottom of this, he pointed out, adding that this system should be changed and the game of money should come to an end.
About the use of money during Senate elections, he said this also happened in the past but this time it happened openly and blatantly. He said that he is pleased to see that the public is getting smarter and is revolting and they should. "Their elected leader was thrown out by four-five people without any reason," he claimed, adding that he did not commit any murder or rob anyone.
The former prime minister said that neither is he a drug smuggler nor is a godfather or Sicilian mafia. Earlier, Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam Nawaz and son-in-law Captain Muhammad Safdar (retd) appeared before Accountability Court Judge Muhammad Bashir hearing corruption cases against them.
During the course of hearing, Sharif's counsel Khawaja Haris told the court that his client was not feeling well and requested the court to exempt him from the hearing after marking his attendance. The court accepted his plea. Haris cross-examined prosecution witness Rao Abdul Hanan, a consular attaché at the Pakistan's High Commission in London, in the Flagship reference, whose statement was recorded during the previous hearing.
The defence counsel questioned the witness if he had recorded in his statement that investigation officer arrived at his office at 5:00pm. The witness said that he did not record this in his statement. To another question, Hanan replied that no company official or land registry officer had confirmed or authenticated the documents. The court after completion of cross-examination of the witness adjourned the hearing till March 7.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.