Ruling alliance bigwigs meet after president announces Punjab polls date

ISLAMABAD: Former president Asif Ali Zardari and chief of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Friday called on Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in Islamabad.

According to the PM Office, the political situation in the country came under discussion during the meeting by the bigwigs of the ruling alliance.

Sources revealed that the Supreme Court's verdict in the polls delay case and elections in Punjab came under discussion during the meeting.

This is the second such meeting in less than 10 days by the political leadership of the country. On February 24, Zardari met Shehbaz to discuss the political situation of the country.

The meeting was held as President Dr Arif Alvi announced April 30 as the date for holding elections in Punjab, hours after the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) sent the president possible poll dates.

The president announced the date after considering the dates proposed by the ECP. The electoral body had proposed a poll date between April 30 to May 7, 2023, for holding general elections of the provincial assembly of Punjab, and had further suggested holding elections preferably on a Sunday.

The national poll body swung into action just a couple of days after the apex court tried to settle the poll controversy and ordered the president and governor K-P to set dates for provincial assemblies’ elections after consulting with ECP.

In the past couple of weeks, the political stalemate had turned into a significant constitutional crisis, especially, when President Alvi announced the date for elections in two provinces as his decision was called “unconstitutional” in the National Assembly within the next few hours.

The hard stance taken by all the mainstream political parties on holding elections in the provinces had pushed the country into a constitutional crisis at a time when the country is already facing a high risk of default.

Though the country has been embroiled in political, economic and constitutional crises for months now, the recent crisis started when former premier and PTI chief Imran Khan dissolved the assemblies in Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa in an attempt to force snap elections on the parties ruling at the centre and other provinces.

However, Punjab Governor Baligur Rehman and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s Governor Haji Ghulam Ali didn’t immediately give a date for elections in the provinces. The matter was subsequently taken to the Lahore High Court (LHC), which directed the ECP to hold elections within the stipulated time period of 90 days.

Following LHC’s order, the ECP consulted the Punjab governor to finalise the election date but failed as Rehman said he had not signed the summary for the dissolution of the assembly thus he was not entitled to announce the election date.