Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Information and Broadcasting Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan, briefed journalists on Sunday and said that government departments concerned will start the process of writing a letter to the United Kingdom from the coming week.” She expressed apprehension on Nawaz Sharif undergoing surgery and getting admitted to hospital, adding that it was time to bring Nawaz Sharif back to Pakistan.
A report in Dawn newspaper quoted Punjab PML-N’s information secretary and MPA Azma Bokhari as saying: “We have received the written order of the PTI’s Punjab government regarding its refusal to grant extension in the stay of Nawaz Sharif abroad on flimsy grounds. The PML-N supremo will challenge the Buzdar administration’s decision in the LHC this week.
Bokhari took the PTI government to task for politicising Nawaz Sharif’s illness, and threatened to write a letter to the US government pertaining to a pending case related to Imran Khan if it was compelled to play the ‘letter game’.
Although some PTI leaders had earlier expressed their concerns regarding the official process for Sharif’s sojourn abroad for medical treatment, Awan blamed a new interest group, and said.
“A section of media ran a campaign to influence opinion (of decision-makers) and build an impression that Nawaz was critically ill. It was rather a fixed match.” The latter claim of the government official regarding a ‘fixed match’ was refuted by her own party’s member and Punjab Health Minister Yasmeen Rashid. While talking to media on Sunday, Yasmeen Rashid said that being a doctor herself, she took the view that the Sharif’s reports were authentic.
The LHC and the Islamabad High Court (IHC) had respectively accepted Sharif’s bail petitions in the Chaudhry Sugar Mills Case and the Al Azizia Mills reference, allowing him to travel to London for his treatment. The IHC, however, stated that the former PM had to approach the Punjab government for an extension in his eight-week stay abroad for medical reasons.
The Punjab government constituted a body of four members to investigate the ailing politician’s application. The body rejected the application, demanding specific and recent medical reports as credible evidence.