Senate chairman slot: Zardari musters enough support for Raza Rabbani

MQM, ANP, PML-Q, BNP-A, BNP-M and four independent senators announce support for PPP nominee

ISLAMABAD:

After playing the guessing game for days, most opposition parties agreed Monday night to field Pakistan Peoples Party’s senior politician, Senator Raza Rabbani, for the office of Senate chairman, virtually dashing the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s hopes for the coveted slot.

PPP Co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari, known for his flexibility and powers of persuasion in negotiations, successfully enlisted the support of Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Awami National Party, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid, Balochistan National Party (Awami), Balochistan National Party (Mengal) and independent senators.

Collectively, these parties have 50-plus senators in the 104-member upper house of parliament. This is well over the numerical strength required to elect the Senate’s chairman and his deputy. Election for the two coveted slots is scheduled for March 12 – the first day of the new parliamentary year of the Senate.



Zardari played his hand deftly. Before Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif could host a luncheon for heads of smaller opposition parties on Tuesday, the PPP co-chairman invited them to dinner at Zardari House in the federal capital Monday evening. Negotiations continued late into the night.

Emerging from the marathon session, leaders of these parties told journalists that they have decided to field Senator Raza Rabbani as a consensus candidate for the office of Senate chairman. They also decided that the deputy chairman should be from Balochistan, though no name has been finalised at the meeting. They said a candidate for the slot would be picked in a meeting with political parties from Balochistan on Tuesday (today).

The PPP has 27 members in the house, MQM has 8, ANP 7, PML-Q 4, BNP-Awami 2, BNP-M 1 and four independent senators. Together their strength is 53. Elections on four seats for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) have been postponed, while two senators-elect of the PML-N face legal challenges to their nomination and hence cannot vote for the chairman and deputy chairman.

In Thursday’s election for 52 Senate seats, the PML-N made sizeable gains but could not emerge as the single largest party, trailing behind the PPP with one seat which means the party has 26 members in the upper house of parliament. The prime minister had formed ministerial teams to woo smaller political groups – and invited their heads to a luncheon meeting on Tuesday in the federal capital.

On the other hand, Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf has decided not to vote for nominees of the PPP and PML-N. Neither of the two parties has so far tried to approach the PTI or its ally Jamaat-i-Islami, which also has one seat in the Senate.

Imran Khan’s party, which has already challenged the candidature of two senators-elect of the PML-N in the Islamabad High Court, filed another petition on Monday pleading that election for chairman and his deputy be stopped till four Fata senators are elected. The PTI and PML-N are expecting at least one member each from Fata.

The PML-N was so desperate for support that it even contacted its arch nemesis, the PML-Q of the Chaudhrys of Gujrat, while Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif spoke to MQM chief Altaf Hussain in first direct telephone contact between the two in nearly two decades.

Both the PML-N and PPP remained in contact with the JUI-F and MQM. Known as hard bargainers, the JUI-F is yet to announce its support, while the PPP succeeded in winning over the MQM reportedly in return for a 40% share in the Sindh government.


Published in The Express Tribune, March 10^th, 2015.