September 25, 2003	Thursday	Rajab 27, 1424

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ISLAMABAD, Sept 24: Process for the unification of the five PML factions has run into serious legal complication within days of an announcement in this regard.

A meeting of the top brass of the PML-Q presided over by party president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain on Wednesday reviewed the legal and constitutional hurdles in the way of dissolution of the party’s organizations and decided to take future step with caution.

The participants were of the view that the dissolution of the party carried the danger of total disarray, while the possibility of emergence of another party could not be ruled out.

Those who attended the meeting included Lt-Gen Majeed Malik, Sardar Nasrullah Dareshak, Salim Saifullah Khan, Syed Kabir Ali Wasti, Maqbool Sheikh, Dilawar Abbas, Khalilur Rahman, Kamil Ali Agha, Tariq Azeem, Dr Khalid Ranjha and Akram Zaki.

Informed sources told Dawn that an overwhelming majority of the participants opposed the dissolution of the party’s organizational setup, fearing that there might be a conspiracy to install the prime minister as the party head in the next stage and Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain might be removed from his post.

The sources said the participants noted with concern the recent meeting of Pir Pagaro with President Gen Musharraf in which the former reiterated the idea of making the chief executive as party president.

The meeting also noted that Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali and Information Minister Sheikh Rashid had extended their full support to the proposal regarding dissolution of party’s organizations.

It is believed that in the next stage a proposal will be mooted to constitute a leadership committee comprising equal number of representatives from each faction which will vote out Chaudhry Shujaat, holding him responsible for the poor performance of the PML and elect the prime minister to the office of the party president.

Speaking at the meeting, Lt-Gen Majeed Malik said constitutional methods should be adopted in dealing with the new situation.

Chaudhry Shujaat said all difficulties in the way of merger of League factions would be removed since unity and unification of the party would strengthen parliamentary democracy in the country.

In an another meeting with Chaudhry Shujaat on Tuesday, the leaders of four League factions Hamid Nasir Chattha, Ijazul Haq, Manzoor Watto and Sheikh Siraj (PML-F), Saeed Minhais, Kabir Ali Wasti, Gen Majeed Malik, Salim Saifullah Khan, Azim Chaudhry, senators Kamil Ali Agha, Tariq Azim and Dilawar Abbas reviewed the post-unification announcement situation.

The meeting decided to appoint Dr Khalid Ranjha to suggest to the party as to how it could be merged with other factions and still keep its position as a senior partner.

Dr Ranjha will start consultations with party leaders/workers from Thursday and sit at the party secretariat and discuss proposals and suggestions with them.

He will prepare his proposals after holding meetings and submit to the party president, the sources said.