ISLAMABAD - After much delay, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Friday nominated party MPA from south Punjab, Sardar Usman Buzdar, the son of a chieftain, as the candidate for the Punjab chief minister’s slot.

Prime Minister-elect Imran Khan himself made the announcement of Sardar Usman Buzdar, first-time MPA, as the next Punjab chief minister through a video message.

Buzdar was not among the top contenders of the PTI for the important slot of CM Punjab. His nomination has surprised many as he is not an old face of the party and has remained affiliated with the PML-Q and PML-N in the past. His family heads the Buzdar tribe and his father remained lawmaker many times in the past. The nomination of Buzdar negates the claims of PTI that it promotes middle class people in the politics.

Within PTI, Mr Buzdar is being considered a weak candidate and the party insiders said that his nomination indicates that someone else from PTI, perhaps Jehanigr Khan Tareen, would run the affairs of Punjab while remaining behind the scene.

Imran Khan in his video message explained the reasons of nomination of Mr Buzdar. “I today have nominated Sardar Usman Buzdar as the candidate of chief minister Punjab and I want to explain the reasons (of this nomination to all of you.”

He further said that Sardar Usman belonged to that area of Punjab that was the most backward where people neither have water, electricity or hospital. The people are living in such a way there as they used to live in old age, he added.

Imran Khan said that the skill of Mr Buzdar was that he knows how the people lived in backward areas and secondly,

 he knows how the poor people of this country led their lives. He said that Buzdar knew the nature of the plight that the people of underprivileged areas faced. He is the only MP whose home had no electricity, he said.

Khan also said that PTI’s vision was to uplift the poor people and the backwards areas. “We believe in this vision and hope that that the honest chief minister would work brilliantly to implement our vision,” he said.

Buzdar, who hails from Taunsa Sharif, had won the 2018 general elections from PP-286 (Dera Ghazi Khan-II). He has a bachelor's degree in law and master's degree in political science. His father Fateh Muhammed Khan Buzdar is the chief of the Buzdar tribe who remained an MPA thrice.

Earlier, he remained tehsil nazim of Taunsa Sharif during Musharraf regime. He was in PML-Q at that time.  Later, he left the party to join Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and contested the 2013 General Election on a PML-N tocket but lost the election.

Before the 2018 general elections, Buzdar joined Janoobi Punjab Suba Mahaz and then joined PTI.

Chieftain’s son nominated for Punjab CM slot