LHC orders NA speaker to take oath of Punjab CM on Saturday

Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday ordered the National Assembly Speaker to take oath from the newly elected Punjab Chief Minster Hamza Shehbaz Sharif on Saturday.

The LHC judge Justice Jawad Hassan pronounced the reserved verdict on Punjab Chief Minister-elect Hamza Shahbaz’s plea seeking the administration of oath to him — as he moved the court for the third time in this regard.

Delivering the verdict, Justice Jawad Hassan directed that Speaker National Assembly Raja Pervez Ashraf should administer oath of Hamza Shehbaz as Punjab Chief Minister at 11:30 am tomorrow [Saturday].

It merits mention that Hamza was elected as Punjab’s chief minister on April 16. However, he hasn’t sworn in yet as his oath-taking was deferred twice despite the LHC’s directives for not delaying the matter any further.

The LHC reserved the verdict on Hamza’s plea on Tuesday, which is the second time PML-N has reached out to the high court for the resolution of the matter.

Earlier, on April 22, the LHC, in a petition of Hamza, ruled that the governor could not refuse oath to a newly-elected chief minister of a province and expected that the president would nominate any person to administer oath to Hamza Shehbaz without a delay.

In his fresh petition, Hamza said it was evident that the governor and the president were not ready to obey the court order, therefore, it was imperative that a person be nominated by the court in order to protect the Constitution and to enforce its provisions with full force.

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