Punjab Chief Minister Pervaiz Elahi has back peddled on his statement about merging the PMLQ faction under him with Imran Khan’s PTI.

The development comes a day after PMLQ President Shujaat Hussain issued a show cause notice to Elahi and others over the proposed merger.

Shujaat and Elahi jointly led PMLQ until April 2022 when Elahi decided to support Imran Khan and Shujaat went with the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM). Their disagreement reached a new height in May when Shujaat tried to stop PMLQ MPAs in Punjab Assembly to vote in favor of Elahi in the chief minister’s election. Since then they have led separate factions with most of the PMLQ MPAs siding with Elahi and MNAs supporting Shujaat.

Elahi earned Imran Khan’s respect for implementing all of his decisions including the one about the dissolution of the Punjab Assembly.

Imran Khan offered Elahi to merge his party with PTI in a TV interview earlier this week. On Monday, Elahi held a meeting of the faction he controls and then indicated a willingness to accept Khan’s proposal.

However, only a day later he appeared to backtrack on the merger, saying the party needs to discuss the proposition with its constituencies.