LAHORE - PML-N President and former Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif will lead caravan of party workers to Allama Iqbal International Airport on Friday to receive party Quaid Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz.

Both PML-N leaders are coming back to face law on the heels of conviction handed down to them in Avenfield reference by the accountability court Islamabad.

The party is making hectic preparations to receive former premier Nawaz Sharif and his daughter and central leader of the party at a very wider scale wherein former legislators and tickets holders, office-bearers and different wings of the party in addition to the local government representatives affiliated with the PML-N have deeply been involved in making return of their leaders a mega show by fetching huge number of people from all over the country. The party has planned to set up camps in every city for gathering PML-N workers.

Former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi will set up the main camp in Islamabad on Thursday when he will be moving to the city leading big rally. Different committees in Punjab and all other provinces have been formed to mobilize the public and transport them to the city on Friday while the party candidates have also been directed to turn their campaign to accord welcome to former prime minister and his daughter by motivating their voters to move to the airport.

In order to give a resounding reception, which however is shrouded in the layers of legal matters, the PML-N leadership also held a meeting at the Model Town secretariat here yesterday. Presiding over the meeting, Shehbaz Sharif sought input from the participants as to the measures which the party might need to adopt in case of arrest or protective bail to former prime minister and his daughter.

The meeting also discussed the matter of courting arrest by the Sharifs to the NAB authorities at Thokar Niaz Beg office. The meeting however strongly wanted that the PML-N procession to the airport should be totally peaceful and no act of violence or disturbance be created anywhere, say the party sources. They said the meeting also took into consideration the government offer to allow PML-N workers reach the airport as long as they will remain peaceful and calm. The meeting discussed the address of Nawaz Sharif as his flight has a long stopover at Abu Dhabi before landing in Lahore at 6:15pm.

The party has also constituted a team of lawyers head by Ch Naseer Ahmad Bhutta to take care of the legal matters relating to the reception and the restrictions facing the workers in reaching the airport.

The party spokesperson Marriyum Aurengzeb told media here yesterday that party workers from Peshawar to Karachi were eagerly waiting to receive their leaders and have their glimpse. July 13, she said, was going to be historic day when the ‘public court’ would make the first show for upholding sanctity of the vote and rule of law. She also slammed PTI Chairman Imran Khan for wasting away Rs71 billion of the people in the name of constructing Metro Bus in Peshawar and highlighted the achievements made by the PML-N during the five years of rule. She demanded probe into Peshawar Metro expenditure terming Imran a leader who knew nothing except telling lies and deceiving masses.

Marriyum also condemned suspension of the local government representatives. She said democracy did not warrant restrictions on the political activists.

Explaining the arrangements for receiving Nawaz Sharif and his daughter in Lahore, she said, the workers will gather at one place from where the PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif will lead them to the airport.

She termed the verdict against Sharifs weak and added, through this decision Nawaz and his daughter were being made ‘political prisoners.’