MUZAFFARABAD – The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) is gearing up for a significant political shift, with plans to remove the current Prime Minister, Chaudhry Anwarul Haq, in a no-confidence motion scheduled for today (Monday).
The motion, which was filed in the AJK Legislative Assembly on Friday, comes after growing dissatisfaction within the ruling coalition.
The PPP, which already enjoys the support of the required 27 members, is poised to replace Anwarul Haq with Raja Faisal Rathore, the PPP’s Secretary-General, who is set to assume the position of AJK Prime Minister.
In a bid to ensure a strong majority, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari met with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, urging the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) to support the motion and join the upcoming coalition government. While the PML-N has agreed to back the no-confidence motion, it has refused to participate in the new government under PPP leadership. Senior AJK PML-N leaders Shah Ghulam Qadir and Raja Farooq Haider have already signed the motion alongside 23 PPP lawmakers.
Meanwhile, the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), along with two smaller parties—Muslim Conference and Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Party—has announced that they will abstain from the process.
In a notable development, two members of the PTI’s “Forward Bloc,” including Minister for Primary Education Diwan Ali Chughtai and Minister for Small Industries Corporation, Taqdees Kausar Gillani, have joined the PPP after meeting with Faryal Talpur. This move brings PPP’s support in the AJK Legislative Assembly to 29 members.
PPP senior leader Chaudhry Qasim Majeed, who is part of Anwarul Haq’s coalition government, expressed confidence that the no-confidence motion would succeed with a large majority, with PML-N’s backing.
The motion accuses Prime Minister Anwarul Haq of undermining the state’s constitutional, ideological, and democratic framework through his “governance style, political narrative, and confrontational approach.”
However, it remains to be seen whether the movers of the no-confidence motion will defend their stance in Monday’s session. Despite these allegations, neither the movers of the motion nor Anwarul Haq himself has resigned.
In an interview with a private television channel, PM Anwarul Haq dismissed the accusations, calling them childish and fabricated. He expressed disbelief over the charges, stating that the individuals responsible for drafting the allegations didn’t even understand what they were writing.
As per the AJK constitution, once the no-confidence motion is approved, the successor named in the resolution, in this case, Faisal Rathore, will automatically be elected as the new Prime Minister of AJK. Should the motion pass, Rathore will become the fourth Prime Minister since the formation of the AJK Legislative Assembly in 2021.
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