Chaudhrys told to keep separate PML-Q identity

PML-Q leaders call meeting of its parliamentarians to take them into confidence negotiations with two major parties.

ISLAMABAD: A majority of lawmakers of Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid, which appears to be considering various options for a new political alignment, have advised their top leadership to maintain the party’s separate identity “at least till the next general elections”.

PML-Q leaders called a meeting of its parliamentarians on Thursday to take them into confidence on the high command’s parallel negotiations with two major parties – the PPP and the PML-N – and also regarding efforts to unify various factions of the Muslim Leagues.

This was the first such formal gathering of lawmakers belonging to the camp of the Chaudhrys of Gujrat after a splinter group made its own faction-PML-like minded. Some central leaders of the party, including Faisal Saleh Hayat, S M Zafar in their speeches advocated that the party should maintain its independent status.

S M Zafar briefed the participants about the meeting he and Tariq Azeem had with PML-N leaders in Lahore last month.

Chaudhry Pervez Ellahi, the party’s Punjab president, said that during his meeting with Babar Awan, the law minister, the later offered to join the coalition government in the center, which, Ellahi claimed he had declined.

Chaudhry Shujaat, the president of the PML-Q, informed his party members that the party had not struck a deal with any of the two major parties but it was keeping its doors open for negotiations.

Meanwhile, a press statement issued after a meeting said that Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain urged all political forces to sit together to extricate the country out of crisis.

“Being a democratic force, PML-Q believes that dialogue is the only way to bridge the gulf between (divergent) political forces and resolve all outstanding issues. In the democratic set up, parliamentary parties have to rise up to the challenges and the parliamentary party should act to take the country out of crisis,” he said while addressing the party’s joint parliamentary party meeting held at his residence.

Briefing the party leaders on his meeting with PML-F leader Pir Sahib Pagara, Chaudhry Shujaat said he had informed Pir Sahib that his party had no reservations if Nawaz Sharif-led PML-N joins the PML alliance.

“However, I have told the Pir Sahib that the like-minded group is not a party and they should not be treated as a separate identity. Instead, they are part of my party – the PML-Q – and if they have any reservation over any issues, I am ready to persuade them to return to the party fold without harming the party’s unity,” he said.

Chaudhry Shujaat also said he was in favour of including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) in the greater PML alliance and urged the Pir Pagara to invite Imran Khan.

Addressing the audience, PML-Q’s Secretary-General Mushahid Hussain said that his party was yet to take a decision on allying itself with the government.

“Ongoing political developments suggest that the significance of the PML-Q has increased manifold. Now, every political outfit wants us on their side. However, we have not decided to join any side. Instead, we have decide to keep all our options open and only a decision would be taken which is in the larger interest of the people of Pakistan and its democratic process,” he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 5^th, 2010.