Nisar refuses to commit smooth sailing for president

PPP calls Nisar in a bid to dissuade him from disrupting the upcoming speech of the president.

ISLAMABAD:

The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) is learnt to have contacted Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, opposition leader in the National Assembly, in a bid to dissuade the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) from disrupting the upcoming speech of the president to a joint sitting of parliament on March 22.

It is learnt that Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani contacted Khan over the phone and discussed the issue of holding the president’s speech to parliament in peace. A PPP delegation is also said to have met Khan to seek his party’s cooperation in this regard.

According to sources, Khan declined to give any assurance in this regard and said that the matter would be decided by PML-N’s parliamentary party. He also avoided the media after the meeting.

Earlier, Prime Minister Gilani told Khan over the phone that the president’s speech was a constitutional requirement and expressed hope that all parliamentary parties would abide by the constitution and rules of business.

The prime minister is also learnt to have taken the leader  of the opposition into confidence over the release of US national Raymond Davis. Sources quoted the prime minister as saying that all political parties had agreed that they would accept the court’s decision.

Khan is said to have urged the prime minister to take the nation into confidence over Davis’ release and said that his party had reservations over the manner in which Davis was freed. Gilani, sources said, informed Khan that a delegation of his party would meet him in this regard.

The PPP team, led by Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Raza Rabbani, met with Khan. Other team members included Naveed Qamar, Nazar Muhammad Gondal and Raja Pervez Ashraf. PML-N’s Zahid Hamid and Sardar Ayaz Sadiq also attended the meeting which lasted more than two hours.

After the meeting, Rabbani told the media that they had discussed three matters with the leader of the opposition in the National Assembly, including Nawaz Sharif’s health, domestic political situation and the president’s scheduled address to parliament.

He said that both parties were aware of the hazards of politics of confrontation, adding that neither of the parties wanted to revert to the politics of the 1990s.

According to sources in the PML-N, the party plans to stage a protest during the president’s speech.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 20^th, 2011.