20th Amendment: Consensus between Government, Opposition reached

All deadlocks between the government and the Opposition have been resolved.

ISLAMABAD: After days of deadlock and with the deadline from the Supreme Court hanging like a sword above them, the Government and Opposition has finally managed to come to a consensus over the proposed 20 amendment.

After days of negotiations, the two sides had managed to come to an agreement over the term of the Chief Election Commissioner on Tuesday, though a deadlock over the caretaker set-up remained.

However, interlocutors from both sides had emerged upbeat after that second meeting, claiming that a compromise was within arm’s reach, while announcing that the talks were to continue.

The government had agreed to the Oppositions demand to not seek an extension for the incumbent Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Justice (Retd) Hamid Ali Mirza when his term expires next month.

Team Government, led by Religious Affairs Minister Khursheed Ali Shah, did not commit itself to bidding farewell to Mirza, whom the opposition termed a ‘partial’ individual who was a ‘handpicked’ choice of President Asif Ali Zardari.

Simultaneously, it was not clear whether the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) had also conceded another opposition demand of making it binding for the government to appoint a new CEC with the ‘approval’ of the opposition leader in the National Assembly.