Fact-check: Maryam Nawaz did not say her daughter graduated at age of 13

A video of Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz is being widely shared on social media with the claim that she said her youngest daughter graduated from college at the age of 13 during a recent speech.

The claim is false. CM Maryam did not say her daughter graduated at the age of 13. In her speech, she said her daughter has recently graduated and recalled that she was 13 years old when she visited her mother in prison.

Claim

On July 4, an account on X, formerly Twitter, shared a 25-second video claiming Punjab CM Maryam said her youngest daughter graduated when she was only 13 years old.

“When my youngest daughter completed her graduation, she was 13-years-old – Maryam Nawaz,” the post read.

The post included a clip of Maryam delivering a speech in English. At the time of writing, it had been viewed more than 152,300 times, liked 3,200 times and reshared 1,200 times.

Identical claims have also been shared on Facebook and Instagram.

Fact

Geo Fact Check reviewed Maryam’s full speech, delivered on July 2 at the National Conference on Prison Reforms, hosted by the Supreme Court in Islamabad.

During the speech, she reflected on her imprisonment in 2018 and 2019 and spoke about the emotional impact of meeting family members while in custody. Recalling visits from her youngest daughter, she said: “For someone behind bars, a meeting with loved ones is not merely a visit, it is often the reminder that life continues beyond prison. My youngest daughter, who has just finished her graduation, was only 13 years old then, and I remember every time she used to walk into the meeting room, she used to leave crying and as a mother, and I know every mother sitting here, every woman sitting here identifies with that. It was a very difficult time.”

The viral clip omits the context of Maryam’s remarks. In the full speech, “has just finished her graduation” refers to her daughter's recent graduation at the time of the speech, while “was only 13 years old then” refers to the period when Maryam was imprisoned and her daughter visited her in jail. The two parts of the sentence refer to different points in time.

The full speech can be viewed at the 12:00 timestamp.

Verdict: CM Maryam did not say her youngest daughter graduated at the age of 13. She said her daughter had recently graduated and was 13 years old when she visited her in prison.

---

Follow us on @GeoFactCheck on X (Twitter) and @geo_factcheck on Instagram. If our readers detect any errors, we encourage them to contact us at [email protected]