Joint presidential candidature: Khursheed Shah calls confab of opposition groupings

Move aimed at building broader support for PPP’s nominee.

ISLAMABAD:

The head of the opposition in the National Assembly Khursheed Shah has called a meeting of the opposition groups on Tuesday [today] in Islamabad to seek support for the PPP Senator Raza Rabbani in the upcoming presidential elections, according to an official in the chamber of the opposition leader.

The official told The Express Tribune that Shah has invited all the opposition parties to discuss the presidential election and seek broad support for Rabbani, adding that Shah is presently in Karachi after a minor surgery and would come to Islamabad by Monday evening or Tuesday morning to attend the meeting.



ANP Senator Haji Adeel said that his party has received an invitation for the meeting. He said that ANP has already announced its decision to support Senator Rabbani for the post of president, adding that he himself signed the nomination papers of Rabbani as proposer.

PML-Q leader Kamil Ali Agha said that his party has also received an invitation from the opposition leader Khursheed Shah and confirmed the party’s participation. Agha added that his party would definitely vote for a joint candidate fielded by the opposition parties, if such a consensus is successfully built. Otherwise, he said, PML-Q has already announced Senator Saeedul Hassan Mandokhail as a presidential candidate and he would contest it.

When asked about the meeting, PTI’s Shah Mehmood Qureshi told The Express Tribune that he was currently in Multan and would make a decision once he has gotten an invitation.

MQM senior leader Wasay Jalil also said that the MQM has yet to receive the invitation from the opposition leader for the meeting.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 23^rd, 2013.