Imran Khan to seek vote of confidence in Pakistani parliament
Islamabad, Mar 4 (efe-epa).- Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Thursday that he will seek a vote of confidence in the national assembly, the lower house of the parliament, on Saturday after his party lost an important seat in the upper house.
“Day after tomorrow I will seek the vote of confidence. It’s the democratic right of my party’s parliamentarians to vote against me,” Khan said in a televised speech to the nation, hours after members of his cabinet had announced the decision on social media.
Adopting a combative stance, the prime minister said losing the vote would not make a difference for him and he would go out “on the streets” with citizens to continue fighting against corruption, which he said was the main reason behind the opposition wanting his ouster.
“The opposition wanted to hang the sword of vote of no confidence on me so I give them (amnesty from corruption cases),” Khan said, claiming that all his opponents had come together to protect their “stolen” wealth.
The vote of confidence comes as a result of the indirect senate elections on Wednesday, in which Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party secured 18 of the 37 seats in the fray, a decent result that fell short of securing the majority in the upper house.
However, the PTI lost an important senate seat in capital Islamabad in a poll among members of the lower house, which meant that some of his coalition partners and even members of the party had voted against the candidate.
This had endangered Khan’s post in case the opposition brought a no-confidence motion after months of protests demanding his resignation over allegations that he had come to power in 2018 through electoral fraud.
“You (Khan) have no justification to keep occupying the prime minister’s house anymore,” PMLN Vice president Maryam Nawaz had tweeted on Wednesday soon after the results.
An alliance of 11 opposition parties, called the Pakistan Democratic Movement, was formed in October and has been holding anti-government protests across major cities of the country since then.
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