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Pakistan’s three-time former prime minister and PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif arrived in Pakistan on Saturday afternoon after a four-year stay in London.
His special flight “Umeed-e-Pakistan” departed from Dubai Airport on Saturday morning and landed at Islamabad Airport this afternoon.
The PML-N supremo’s legal team including former law minister Senator Azam Tarar and party leaders were present at the airport to receive him.
Tarar said Nawaz will be consulted on political and legal issues upon his arrival, adding that the ex-premier will head to the VIP lounge after landing.
He confirmed that the court staff also reached the airport and now “the legal process of security guarantee will be completed”.
Ex-deputy mayor Zeeshan Naqvi was also present at the airport along with the oath commissioner for signing legal documents. The legal team of Nawaz will go inside the plane to take his biometrics and signatures.
Before boarding his flight, Nawaz said he was “happy to return”. He is likely to face a host of legal challenges before embarking on his election campaign to rev up his party’s prospects in the lead-up to elections due in Jan next year.
Party leader Ishaq Dar said Nawaz would arrive at Minar-i-Pakistan at 5pm today on schedule to address the gathering.
“On a media channel, there is news that Mian Nawaz Sharif will first go to Jati Umra and will later go to Minar-i-Pakistan at 7pm. This news is not true,” he said in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
Nawaz will spend at least one hour at Islamabad Airport after that, he will board the plane again for Lahore. From the airport, he is scheduled to leave for the gathering in a helicopter.
Earlier in Dubai, Nawaz said they represented May 28, not May 9 – a reference to the nuclear tests conducted during his stint as prime minister in 1998 and the PTI’s role in the violence earlier this year.
“We are of May 28; we are not of May 9,” he told reporters at the airport before his historic departure for Islamabad after spending four years in self-exile.
The three-time prime minister questioned whether they could see the old Pakistan, as he referred to the current state of affairs when compared to the period before his ouster. Back then, bread was available for Rs4 with the provision of free-cost medicines, he added.
Why the matters had reached this point, he regretted. “It shouldn’t have had happened.”
Nawaz reminded the reporters that he had left the matter up to Almighty Allah and was returning to the country as vindicated, adding that he and his daughter – Maryam Nawaz were – jailed in bogus cases.
He described the country’s current top electoral body as a “fair” Election Commission, which, he added, was authorized to call polls in the country. The Commission would hold free and fair elections, the PML-N supremo expressed the hope.
