WORLD NEWS | ‘Game over’ for cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan: Mariam Nawaz

ISLAMABAD, May 27 (PTI) Maryam Nawaz, senior vice-president of the PML-N party, has told Imran Khan that the cricketer-turned-politician’s “game is over” following the exodus of senior members of his party.

Mariam made the remarks at a congress in Pakistan’s Punjab province on Friday. In her speech, she also addressed the events of May 9, the day Khan, chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek Intifada (PTI), was arrested, sparking violent protests across the country.

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Mariam, the 49-year-old daughter of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supreme leader and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, told PTI chief Khan that “the game is over” following the exodus of senior members of the party.

More than 70 lawyers and leaders of the party have parted ways with PTI to follow the may 9 chaos. Top PTI leaders – including the party’s secretary-general Asad Omar, former information minister Fawad Chaudhry and former human rights minister Shireen Mazari – have resigned.

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There is a problem with those who quit the party, Maryam said while mocking the mass departure of leaders at PTI.

After attacks on public and military institutions, security forces began a crackdown on the party and PTI leaders began to withdraw.

“How are people going to see it when the leader is himself a jackal?” She criticized the former prime minister, who was sacked last April following a no-confidence vote in the National Assembly.

“Your people revealed that Imran Khan, 70, was the mastermind of the May 9 (incident),” she added.

The senior vice president of PML-N said Khan was the mastermind of the May 9 “terrorism” but his workers were facing anti-terrorism courts.

Khan brought his wife, Bushra Bibi, to court with sheets, but he let other women spearhead him, she said. Khan and his wife were covered in white sheets when they arrived at the Lahore High Court on May 15 in the Al-Qadir Trust case.

Mariam said the May 9 incident was an “attack on the Pakistani army”, adding that the former prime minister was assisted by his “facilitator”.

Violent protests erupted after paramilitary rangers arrested Khan from the Islamabad High Court (IHC) building on May 9.

In response to Khan’s arrest, his party operatives vandalized more than a dozen military installations, including the army commander’s residence in Lahore, the Mianwali air base and the ISI building in Faisalabad.

Mobs also stormed the Army Headquarters (GHQ) in Rawalpindi for the first time.

Police put the death toll in the violence at 10, while Khan’s party claimed 40 of its workers were killed in fire from security personnel.

Thousands of Khan’s supporters were arrested following violence that the powerful army called a “dark day” in the country’s history.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)