ISLAMABAD: Nawaz Sharif, three-time elected prime minister of Pakistan, will return to his home country on October 21 after spending almost four years in self-imposed exile in the United Kingdom, his Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party said on Tuesday.
Sharif, the elder brother of Pakistan’s outgoing prime minister Shehbaz Sharif, has been residing in London since November 2019 after being granted temporary release from prison on medical grounds, following his conviction in a corruption reference.
The three-time former prime minister maintains that the charges against him were “politically motivated” and that he never indulged in any financial wrongdoing.
“The architect of Pakistan and the leader of the people Muhammad Nawaz Sharif will return home on October 21,” Marriyum Aurangzeb, the PML-N information secretary, announced on X messaging platform, citing the younger Sharif.
“God willing, Nawaz Sharif will be warmly welcomed upon his return home.”
The circumstances remained quite tough for the PML-N since the disqualification of Sharif in July 2017, with political opponents accusing the government of former prime minister Imran Khan of pushing them into a corner.
However, a change of the government in April 2022 saw the younger Sharif taking over the PM’s office, following Khan’s ouster in a parliamentary no-trust vote.
The tables have since turned in the South Asian country and Sharif is once again seen as one of the frontrunners in the race to become the next prime minister of Pakistan.
“The whole of Pakistan, God willing, is awaiting the return of Mian Nawaz Sharif, and the economy and the country will again flourish in the same manner where Nawaz Sharif left Pakistan in 2017,” Shehbaz, flanked by Sharif and PML-N affiliates, later announced outside their London residence.
He maintained his elder brother was ousted from power in a “fake” and “baseless” case, and it deprived the Pakistani people of progress and prosperity.