LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Vice President Maryam Nawaz Saturday responded to PTI leader Shireen Mazari’s arrest, saying that she was “not happy” about it.
During an interaction with PML-N’s social media team, Maryam said: “I was not happy to learn about Mazari’s arrest, but I saw on TV that the case against her was established during Buzdar’s government and it was related to an 800-acre land which belonged to the state.”
Maryam said the anti-corruption department had arrested Mazari, adding that “they must’ve had their reasons.”
“I saw on TV that the PTI was using the woman card [to defend Mazari],” she said.
“If the allegations are proven false, and she comes out innocent, then I promise that I will stand beside her,” the PML-N vice president said.
Talking about her own arrest, Maryam said she was meeting the former prime minister and PML-N supremo at the Kot Lakhpat Jail when a National Accountability Bureau (NAB) team came to apprehend her in 2019.
“I informed Nawaz Sharif about the arrest. But despite being a father, he maintained his composure and as he tried to hug me, the NAB team — which was outside the jail — came inside and arrested me in front of my father while my daughter cried.”
She recalled that in response to her arrest, Nawaz had said: “Time does not stand still.”
Read more: CM Hamza orders release of PTI leader Shireen Mazari
Berating the PTI government, Maryam said no case was registered against her for four months.
“But I did not play the victim or the woman card […] I was kept in a death cell despite being innocent,” the PML-N vice president said, stressing that despite all this, she did not “believe in revenge”.
The PML-N vice president noted that although Mazari was arrested by women police officials, “I was arrested by men both times when I was put behind bars.”
Turning her guns on PTI Chairman and former premier Imran Khan, Maryam said he could not blame the courts for opening their doors at midnight when he was “violating the Constitution”.
“The courts opened as you committed a serious offence of violating the Constitution. Do you expect courts to not take notice when you violate the Constitution?”
