Turncoat lawmakers should be barred from contesting elections: Farrukh Habib

Islamabad: Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib said on Friday that the lawmakers’ vote was the trust of the electorate and turncoats who betray them by violating party directives should be barred from contesting elections.

Talking to media outside the Supreme Court, he said that the presidential reference was in front of the Supreme Court and the people want an answer to this question. Those who have looted national wealth were now facing cases in courts of law and society has rejected such elements.

He said that billions of rupees were transferred here through characters like Pupper Wala, Faluda Wala, Maqsood Chapardassi by the bigwigs of the opposition.

Farrukh Habib said it was a strange spectacle that there was no case of corruption against the Prime Minister whereas those who tabled the no-confidence movement were all corrupt.

Speaker National Assembly, he said, did not commit any violation of the constitution and the opposition was making hue and cry which was a manifestation of their frustration.

If the opposition had the required support for the no-confidence motion, then why were worried, he asked.

Farrukh Habib said first the opposition tried to get rallies banned through the courts and now they had changed the date of their own rally.

“No one will attend the opposition public meeting, on the contrary, there will be a sea of people in the PTI meeting on March 27,” said Farrukh Habib.

About PTI’s allies, he said the alliance was established three and a half years ago and they were still part of the coalition cabinet and they were still in the alliance.

“We are not against the no-trust motion,” he said, but the question arose if Pakistan’s democracy could be hijacked by a few billions of rupees. No trust motion on the basis of horse-trading was against the spirit of the democracy”, he remarked.

He said that Imran Khan believed in fighting till the last ball, and there was no question of resignation and the NRO gang would be defeated and truth and justice would emerge victoriously.

He said that PTI was holding rallies in different parts of the country, and such rallies on one day’s notice was not an easy task.

Public opinion must come to the fore as every political party can exercise its democratic right, the minister added.