October 12, 2002	Saturday	Sha'aban 5, 1423

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PESHAWAR, Oct 11: The Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (Fazl-ur-Rehman group) may stake its claim to the top executive slots in the NWFP and Balochistan after it won the largest number of seats within the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) in the two provinces, senior party officials said.

“We have emerged as a senior partner. Naturally, we would like to be given a senior role “, a party official in Peshawar told Dawn .

Senior MMA leader and JUI(F) Secretary-General Maulana Fazlur Rehman refused to discuss the issue. But he did say that his party would play a central role both in the NWFP and Balochistan after it emerged that it had bagged the largest number of seats within the MMA.  

“It is obvious that we have won more seats than any other party in the MMA, both in the NWFP and Balochistan. We will play a pivotal role”, he told Dawn by phone from Dera Ismail Khan.

He, however, hastened to add that all decisions in this regard would be taken at the coalition’s platform through mutual discussions.

No date has been fixed for the MMA central leadership meeting, but Maulana said it would be convened soon in Islamabad.

“All issues would be decided through consensus”, Mr Rehman said.

According to unofficial final results, the MMA has bagged 47 seats in the NWFP, followed by independents with 14 seats. The PPP and ANP have received eight seats each. The PPP (Sherpao) has clinched nine seats, the PML (Q) seven seats, the PML(N) five and the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf got only one seat.

A further break-up of seats won by the six-party religious conglomeration revealed that almost one-third of the MMA seats in the NWFP Assembly had gone to Fazlur Rehman’s party followed by Qazi Hussain Ahmad’s Jamaat-i-Islami and Samiul Haq’s own faction of JUI (S).

Even in the National Assembly, out of the MMA’s total 29 seats, 15 belong to the JUI(F), 12 to the Jamaat-i-Islami and two to the JUI(S).

It is still not clear as to who would the JUI(F) field as its candidate for the office of the chief minister. The MMA and JUI(F) leaders do not hide the fact that Maulana Fazlur Rehman himself was interested in the job. But in that case, say Fazlur Rehman’s party officials, he would have to relinquish his two National Assembly seat and find a willing party member of the NWFP Assembly to vacate his seat in his favour.

“He is too keen to repeat the feat of his father and become the chief minister of the NWFP”, remarked a political analyst.

Mr Rehman’s father, Maulana Mufti Mahmood, was the chief minister of the NWFP in 1970.  

Mufti Mahmood had resigned in protest when Zulfikar Ali Bhutto dismissed the NAP government in Balochistan in 1973.

“It is still premature to say as to who will we field as our candidate for the chief ministership. We have a board within the party which takes such decisions, and that is precisely the right forum for such matters”, another party leader said.

A senior Jamaat leader confirmed that the matter had come up for the discussion at an MMA meeting before elections, but while his party had no objection to let a JUI(F) nominee become the chief minister, it had politely told its counterpart to nominate someone else instead for his own better image.

In that case, say the JUI officials, the party may back its senior parliamentarian Akram Khan Durrani for the top slot in the NWFP.

Another party official opined that the JUI(F) might get the opportunity to lead the MMA government in the NWFP if it agreed to back Qazi Hussain Ahmad as the parliamentary leader in the National Assembly.