January 26, 2003	Sunday	Ziqa’ad 22,1423

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)

ISLAMABAD, Jan 25: The People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) will consider alliances for next month’s Senate elections at a meeting to be held in Islamabad on Friday, party sources said on Saturday.

A PPP announcement simply said the meeting of the party’s National Assembly members at the parliament house would “deliberate on the current political situation in the country and to chalk out strategy for the Senate elections”. But party sources said the main focus would be on possible alliances with other parties in an effort to win the maximum possible number of seats in the 100-seat Senate, 88 of whose members from the four provinces will be elected by the provincial assemblies on Feb 24.

Eight senators from the FATA will be elected by National Assembly members from FATA and four senators from the federal capital by the entire National Assembly on Feb 27.

All the parties have already nominated their candidates for the Senate and they have filed nomination papers with the election authorities.

The PPP, which emerged as the largest single party in the 342-seat National Assembly and the largest in the Sindh provincial assembly in the Oct 10 general elections, sits on the opposition benches not only in the federal legislature but also in all the four provinces.

This situation may see it aligning with one party in one province and a different party in another province.

The Jan 31 meeting, which will follow a meeting of the PPP-led Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD) in Lahore on Jan 29 and an all-parties conference convened there by ARD chief Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan for Jan 30, is also likely to consider the prospects of the party getting the office of leader of the opposition in the National Assembly.

PPP leader Makhdoom Amin Fahim, who likely to be supported also by other ARD parties, is a candidate for the office, which is also eyed by the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal alliance of six Islamic parties.