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LAHORE: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) MP Wasiq Qayyum Abbasi on Saturday, was elected unopposed the deputy speaker of Punjab Assembly after the Opposition announced a boycott of the polls.
The deputy speaker’s slot fell vacant after a no-trust motion, tabled by PTI’s Raja Basharat, and ousted Dost Mohammad Mazari from the office.
Wasiq Qayyum Abbasi, the joint candidate of PTI and PML-Q, was the only candidate who submitted the nomination papers for the deputy speaker slot as the opposition alliance joint candidate failed to pitch their candidate till the deadline.
Speaking with the media persons, Gilani said that the Opposition has boycotted the elections as they are not “clean and transparent”.
“We had strong objections regarding the election process,” said the candidate.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) has challenged the election of PTI’s Sibtain Khan as speaker Punjab Assembly in the Lahore High Court (LHC), alleging that the poll was not held through secret ballot.
The appeal from PML-N was moved by Mansoor Usman Awan stating that the election process did not fulfil constitutional and legal formalities.
“The election for speaker is held through a secret ballot and printing serial numbers on the ballot papers for the election held on Friday violated the legal and constitutional binding,” it said and demanded of the LHC to declare the election of Sibtain Khan as null and void and order a re-election of the speaker Punjab Assembly.
It should be noted that PTI candidate Sibtan Khan was elected as the new speaker of the Punjab Assembly on Friday.