ISLAMABAD, June 14: The National Assembly, while attended only by the ruling coalition members, passed a unanimous resolution on Saturday to repose full confidence in President Pervez Musharraf ahead of his four-nation Western tour beginning next week.

The resolution was not originally on the agenda of the last day of the Assembly’s eight-day budget session but was moved by Pakistan Muslim League-Q president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain at the start of the second afternoon sitting of the lower house and was backed by other allied parties.

No opposition member was present in the assembly at the time as all opposition parties had walked out of the lower house in the morning as part of their prolonged protest against the LFO.

“Expressing full confidence in the leadership of President Gen Pervez Musharraf, the National Assembly notes with satisfaction that it is because of his successful policies that he has been invited to pay a special visit to America, Britain, France and Germany,” said the Urdu-language resolution.

“The National Assembly gives great importance to this visit and, on this occasion, assures him (the president) of its full support and cooperation,” it said.

The surprise resolution seemed to be a ruling coalition response to a demand by the combined parliamentary opposition that Gen Musharraf cancel the foreign trip because they said he was a controversial president and could not speak for the country.

The resolution passed by the oppositionless house said the president would be able to “rightly project Pakistan’s standpoint” in his talks with the leaders of the four countries in the best interest of the country.

“In this context, the National Assembly considers it necessary to identify those elements that are busy in efforts to weaken the country and democracy at this important juncture and during such important talks,” the resolution said in an apparent reference to the opposition campaign against the president.

“These are elements who are becoming an obstruction in the democratic process now going on in the country,” it added.

“The National Assembly endorses all those policies initiated during President Musharraf’s government as a result of which the nation is moving towards economic revival and Pakistan’s prestige in the international community has been enhanced, and guarantees the continuity of these policies under the leadership of Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali,” the resolution said.

Several members from the ruling coalition who endorsed the resolution and voiced confidence in the president included PML-Q chief whip and Labour and Manpower Minister Abdul Sattar Laleka, Interior Minister Makhdoom Saleh Hayat and Sher Afgan Niazi (both of PPP-Patriots), and Housing and Works Minister Syed Safwanullah (MQM).

Others who supported the resolution were Maulana Azam Tariq (independent), Khuda Bakhsh Nizamani (PML-F), Syed Tanvir Shah (MQM), Ms Mehnaz Rafi (PML-Q), Amir Orakzai (independent from Federally Administered Tribal Areas) and Professor Mushtaq Victor (minorities).