November 12, 2002	Tuesday	Ramazan 6, 1423

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ISLAMABAD, Nov 11: Maulana Fazlur Rahman, the MMA’s secretary general and its candidate for prime minister’s office, held a meeting with Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan, chief of the ARD, to seek clarifications about PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto’s latest statement with regard to formation of the party’s government.

Benazir Bhutto, it may be mentioned, has claimed in a fresh interview that her party enjoyed support of 174 MNAs and was able to form its government but at the same time said that her party was against forming a coalition with MMA.

The MMA leader expressed his optimism about a positive outcome of the hard talks started with the PML-Q on issues such as the LFO and NSC.

So far, the PML-Q leadership’s whole stress has been on offices, while we advocated settling of contentious issues, he said.

Maulana Fazlur Rahman said: “We are considering our position after the PPP leader’s statement and we will discuss and take a decision in the MMA’s forum.”

He said the government was defaming the politicians through the media, accusing them of having failed to arrive at a settlement outside parliament, while “we stand for the solution of all issues inside parliament.”

Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan, when asked to comment on the statement of PPP President Makhdoom Amin Fahim that his party had not supported MMA candidate for the premiership, said: “Everyone is free to state anything he wishes”.

The Nawabzada said all the politicians had spoken with one voice in demanding early convening of the assembly, so as to resolve all issues inside parliament.

He termed the so-called “deadlock” a creation of the forces who were not interested in the success of democracy.

He said the idea of an APC was still on, but due to the preoccupation of senior politicians its dates could not be finalized.

Commenting on Musharraf-Qazi meeting, the Nawabzada said: “We are not averse to political dialogue provided it was meaningful”.