Pak PM Khan sacks Punjab governor; election of new chief minister deferred

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday sacked Punjab province’s Governor Chaudhry Sarwar while the election of the new provincial chief minister has been deferred.

Following in the footsteps of the National Assembly, Punjab Assembly’s Deputy Speaker Sardar Dost Muhammad Mazari, citing the “international conspiracy” to topple the Imran Khan government, refused to conduct election of the chief minister and deferred the session until April 6.

Later, the Speaker’s office said that since there was ruckus in the House, it deferred the proceedings to conduct the election of the chief minister.

Chaudhry Parvez Elahi was the candidate of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) coalition while the joint opposition’s candidate was Hamza Shehbaz, who is the son of PML-N president and Opposition leader in National Assembly Shehbaz Sharif.

The Punjab Assembly session took place at the same time as the National Assembly session.

Earlier in the morning, Prime Minister Khan sacked Punjab governor Sarwar and replaced him with Umar Sarfraz.

Sarwar, in a press conference, claimed to be in possession of “many secrets of Imran Khan”, saying he should not force him to reveal them.

He said that Khan had selected an “inept chief minister Usman Buzdar” despite the Opposition from his party.

Sarwar said that Khan had asked him to convene the Punjab Assembly session at midnight in violation of the Constitution.

He further claimed that he had tendered his resignation two days ago.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)