News / Pakistan

Pakistanis voting in Lahore for Sharif’s parliament seat

Sunday, 17 September 2017 9:55 AM [ Last Update: Wednesday, 20 September 2017 8:15 AM ]

In this photograph, which was taken on May 4, 2013, the daughter of Pakistan’s former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Maryam (R), and her mother, Kulsoom (L), wave to supporters during an election campaign rally in Lahore, Pakistan. (By AFP)

Pakistanis have started going to polls in a by-election seen as a test of support for the family of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif ahead of the 2018 general elections.

Polls opened on Sunday in the eastern city of Lahore for a parliamentary seat vacated by the ousted prime minister.

The ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party hopes to see a resounding victory in the vote.

Winning the ballot in the vacant constituency would show that the Sharif family still has undiminished public support despite the Supreme Court’s removal in July of the then prime minister Sharif from office over corruption charges.

Kulsoom Sharif, Nawaz’s wife, is the PML-N candidate in the vote.

Sharif’s daughter, Maryam, who has been at the helm of the PML-N campaign for her mother and who some party leaders see as a future leader of the faction, has described the event as a good chance for Sharif’s supporters to put on a show of force by handing the party a strong victory.

“Will you take revenge for your disrespected vote?” Maryam asked supporters at a recent rally.

On the other side of Pakistan’s political spectrum, opposition leader Imran Khan, whose efforts helped oust Sharif, accused the Sharif family of corruption.

Pakistani opposition leader and chairman of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party Imran Khan gestures to supporters during a rally in Islamabad on July 30, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

“Your prime minister owns some of the most expensive real estate in the world — all in his daughter’s name. Meanwhile, half the children of this country are malnourished,” Khan, who is a former cricket star and the Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party head, told a rally on Saturday.

Khan said voters in Lahore must choose whether to vest their trust in the Supreme Court judges or a “thief,” an apparent reference to Sharif.

Sunday “is going to be an epic battle in Lahore… You have to decide who you are going to support, whether you are with the judiciary, or with a dacoit.”

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