PPP-CEC meeting: President seeks early all parties conference

PPP approves president’s contacts with other parties for new alliance.

KARACHI:

President Asif Ali Zardari has instructed Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) officials to step up consultations with their colleagues in other parties represented in parliament in order to quickly hold an all parties conference.

Members of the PPP’s Central Executive Committee (CEC) from Sindh met at Bilawal House on Sunday and discussed the proposed all parties conference and the PPP’s “reconciliation process” with other parties at the national and provincial level, presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar told The Express Tribune.

Babar said in a press release that the president had asked the PPP committee being constituted for the proposed conference to step up the process of consultation with other parties. He said that the president believed that there was an urgent need to engage the political parties in a meaningful and productive consultation as soon as possible.

“The meeting decided that the PPP’s policy of reconciliation will continue and the doors will remain open for all the parties in the parliament for a broader and deeper political reconciliation,” said the press release.

Babar said that the meeting reposed full confidence in Zardari’s leadership and authorised him to talk to all political parties for arriving at a consensus on major issues facing the country.

Sources said that the CEC had authorised the president to pursue a coalition with any political party. They added that the party’s relationship with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) was the major topic at the meeting. The government’s tussle with the Supreme Court over the appointment of the National Accountability Bureau chairman was also discussed in detail.

The CEC agreed to chart the party’s future course after Interior Minister Rehman Malik meets MQM chief Altaf Hussain in London, the sources said. They added that a scheduled meeting between an MQM delegation and the president had been postponed till Monday when Malik returns.

The CEC members who attended the meeting included Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Syed Qaim Ali Shah, Senator Mian Raza Rabbani, Faryal Talpur, Nisar Khohro, Syed Naveed Qamar, Nabeel Gabol, Senator Islamuddin Shaikh, Pir Mazharul Haq, Dr Zulfiqar Mirza and Fouzia Wahab.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 14^th, 2011.