Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb strongly reacted to PTI leader Chaudhry Fawad Hussain’s statement regarding the vote to elect Punjab chief minister saying that PML-N’s Hamza Shehbaz was declared successful after the votes were counted and due to the implementation of Supreme Court’s judgment.

“PML-Q’s 10 votes were rejected in light of the Supreme Court’s decision,” the information minister clarified.

Earlier today during a presser, PTI leader and former information minister Fawad Chaudhry had said the country could not accept the politics of PPP co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari.

“There should be an auction, not an election.”

He rejected the Punjab deputy speaker’s ruling saying that the mandate of the people had been stolen during yesterday’s election.

Earlier on Friday (yesterday), Hamza received 179 votes while the PTI-PML-Q joint candidate Chaudhry Pervez Elahi received 186 votes. However, Punjab Assembly Deputy Speaker Dost Muhammad Mazari refused to count 10 votes of PML-Q members after PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain wrote a letter directing his party members to not vote for the PTI-backed candidates in the runoff election.

Aurangzeb, while lashing out at Fawad for criticising PML-N, said that the Parliament is formed by the Constitution and operates only under the Constitution.

Aurangzeb said that Shujaat issued the same instructions to his party members, which Imran Khan had issued.

“If the ruling is in favour of Imran Khan, it is constitutional and if it is in favour of his opponents, it is unconstitutional,” she said.

She said that the constitution and law could not be altered by Imran Khan’s bullying threats and abuse. “His lies, corruption and hypocrisy are causing irreparable damage to the country,” she added.

There had been no development made in the country during PTI’s tenure, instead, the country was on the brink of bankruptcy, the minister said.

The information minister said that Imran Khan had spared no effort to turn the country into another Sri Lanka.