A no-confidence motion was submitted against Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser on Friday.
The resolution moved by two PPP MPAs is likely to delay the provincial government’s announcement of its budget for the upcoming fiscal year.
PPP MPAs Fakhar Azam Wazir and Ziaullah Afridi submitted separate motions against Asad Qaisar. KP Assembly Secretary Nasrullah Khattak said that the motions would be presented in the House on May 14.
Currently, no political party has majority in the 124-member house. The PTI’s strength has shrunk from 63 to 43 after its leadership issued show cause notices to its 20 MPAs for allegedly selling their votes in the Senate elections.
The JI, which has seven members in the house, has formally announced that it is quitting the PTI-led ruling coalition in the province, but has assured Chief Minister Pervez Khattak of its continued support on the budget.
Meanwhile, 13 MPAs have demanded that Governor Iqbal Zafar Jhagra should ask CM Khattak to seek a fresh vote of confidence from the assembly.
“If the speaker has the majority, he should show it,” Wazir said, adding that his party did not want to make a ‘political martyr’ out of Khattak and, therefore, was just asking for Qaiser’s removal.
Speaking to the media on Friday, Ziaullah Afridi said the PTI had lost its majority in the assembly and demanded the resignations of both the speaker and the CM.
Khattak, however, was confident of continuing as the chief minister. “I received assurances that a no-trust motion will not be brought against me and that I will continue to serve as CM,” he told a news conference on Thursday. “I know all the tricks to pass the budget and show majority in the House.”
The JI’s move to quit the government came after its emir Sirajul Haq questioned the credibility of the Senate chairman election, claiming that the PTI voted for Balochistan independent candidate Sadiq Sanjrani following ‘an order from the top’.
Published in Daily Times, May 5th 2018.
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