Pakistan’s parliament will meet on Friday to pass a no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Imran Khan, the lower house speaker’s cabinet said Sunday, in what will be the toughest test since he came to power in 2018.
An alliance of opposition parties filed the motion this month against Khan, saying he had lost his parliamentary majority after more than a dozen defections from his party, raising the risk of political unrest in the nuclear-armed South Asian country.
Under the constitution, the Speaker of the House of Representatives must convene the session within 14 days of receiving the motion, which was due to fall on Monday.
But a statement from the speaker’s office said the date has been postponed for several days due to a conference of Islamic countries in Islamabad scheduled for March 23.
The opposition accuses Khan of mismanaging the economy and foreign policy. He denies this. No Pakistani prime minister has ever completed his full term in office.
Due to the loss of dissident lawmakers, Khan has about a dozen seats less than the minimum – 172 – needed for a majority. The joint opposition has 163 seats in the lower house but could achieve a majority if most defectors effectively join its ranks through a vote of no confidence.
The opposition and political analysts also say Khan has feuded with Pakistan’s powerful military, whose support is critical for any party to rise to power as the former cricketer’s upstart party did four years ago.
Khan and the military deny the allegation.
This post Pakistan parliament to meet this week for no-confidence vote against Prime Minister Khan
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