Their names have been submitted to the Punjab Assembly speaker. PHOTO: FILE
LAHORE:
The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) on Friday submitted the names of three representatives in a committee that will take up the appointment of a caretaker chief minister in Punjab.
The party has picked PML–Quaid’s (PML-Q) former parliamentary leader in the Punjab Assembly Chaudhry Zahiruddin Khan and two of its leaders Chaudhry Shaukat Mehmood Basra and Major (retd) Zulfiqar Gondal.
Their names have been submitted to the Punjab Assembly speaker. The move comes in the wake of a deadlock between ex-leader of the house in the Punjab Assembly Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif and former opposition leader Raja Riaz.
The PML-N has not yet proposed their members for the committee.
Riaz forwarded these names to Punjab Assembly Speaker Rana Muhammad Iqbal Khan for further notification.
According to Basra, the deadlock entered its second day, whereas under Article 224A of the Constitution, legislators only have three days to wrap up their consultations on the appointment of a caretaker chief minister.
He said that after the dissolution of PA, March 21, 22, 23 were the days for which Shahbaz and Riaz had to hold dialogues on a name for the interim CM but they failed to do so.
Earlier, Shahbaz rejected three of PPP’s nominees, Justice (retd) Syed Zahid Bukhari, former Chief Secretary Hafeez Akhtar Randhawa and Mian Aamir Mehmood. The opposition in PA, however, rejected two of the Punjab government’s names – Justice (retd) Aamir Raza Khan and former Federal Secretary Khawaja Zaheer.
Under Article 224A, in case the chief minister and the leader of the opposition in the outgoing provincial assembly fails to nominate a person appointed as caretaker CM within three days of the dissolution of the assembly, they shall forward two nominees each to a committee immediately constituted by the speaker of the provincial assembly.
This committee comprises six members of the outgoing provincial assembly, having equal representation from the treasury and the opposition, to be nominated by the chief minister and the leader of the opposition respectively. The committee finalises the name of the caretaker CM within three days – in this case they have to deliberate between March 24 and March 26.
If the committee fails, the matter is then referred to the ECP for a final decision.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 23rd, 2013.
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