Elections can't be held until justice is served to Nawaz Sharif: Maryam

Senior Vice President and Chief Organiser of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Maryam Nawaz said on Monday that elections would be held after justice is served to party supremo Nawaz Sharif in corruption cases, Aaj News reported.

While addressing a party’s workers’ convention in Sahiwal, Maryam claimed that a previous military establishment in connivance with Supreme Court judges ousted his father from power.

“Nawaz Sharif made Pakistan an atomic power and provided cheap electricity, gas, and daily use items. Pakistan made impressive progress during Nawaz Sharif’s tenures, but when he was ousted through a conspiracy, the economy nosedived,” she said.

Maryam said justice must be done with Nawaz and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan must be brought to justice and then the elections would be held in the country.

The PML-N Vice President alleged that former Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Saqib Nisar (retired), and former spy chief Gen Faiz Hameed (retired) conspired against Nawaz Sharif, claiming that the two individuals were still supporting Imran Khan “through their pawns”.

Maryam also brought up the leaked audio clip of former judge Arshad Malik, in which he allegedly confessed that he convicted Nawaz Sharif under duress. The PML-N leader referred to this as evidence of the previous PTI government’s manipulation of the judiciary to target her party.

In an address last week, Maryam displayed photographs of five people from the military and judiciary on the screen and accused them of supporting Imran. They were former ISI chief Lt Gen Faiz Hameed (retd), former chief justices of Pakistan Saqib Nisar and Asif Saeed Khosa, serving SC judges Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi and Ijazul Ahsan.

“Lt Gen Faiz (retired) was the head of this ‘gang’, adding he wanted to become the army chief, for which he needed a pawn to use. Since Nawaz Sharif couldn’t comprise, he picked Imran Khan,” Maryam said.

She claimed Gen Faiz told a PDM party leader that Nawaz had to be cut to size, as he was getting too big.

The former spy chief also picked “corrupt and incompetent” judges like former CJPS, Saqib Nisar and Asif Saeed Khosa, as well as some serving judges to disqualify Nawaz and make sure they were sitting on the benches hearing his cases.

Now that the establishment had withdrawn its support of Imran, he was being facilitated by the judiciary, she claimed.

“These judges are remnants of Gen Faiz’s era. The corrupt former corps commander also committed financial corruption and siphoned off money abroad.”