LAHORE, Oct 21: The MMA has announced that it would take decisions regarding the LFO, uniform and an anti-government drive, in December.

The announcement was made by Syed Munawar Hasan, secretary-general of the second largest component of six-party religious alliance, Jamaat-i-Islami, while talking to reporters here on Tuesday.

Responding to a query about repeated extension of the deadline, he said: “It is true that the rulers’ agenda is to gain time (through extension of talks). But we are ignoring these tactics only in the larger national interest. We want to save the country from chaos.”

Keeping in view internal problems of the PML-Q, whose president, Shujaat Husain, had no interaction with the prime minister, the MMA had been lenient in setting a deadline for an agreement on the LFO, he said. But, he added, this phase was over, and now the rulers were taking advantage of the flexibility being shown by the alliance.

He said the uniform issue had been settled at all levels but they did not know why a cutoff date for shedding uniform was not being given. Emphasizing that the alliance would not accept a verbal commitment on the issue, he said if Gen Pervez Musharraf claimed that he was a man of his word, why he was reluctant to give a final date. “Such attitude is adopted only by a person who is not sure whether he could keep his promise.”

To another question, Mr Hasan said the general had failed to implement his much hyped seven-point agenda, and also violated the Supreme Court verdict which had given him only three years for transferring power back to civilians.

He said that MMA activists were disturbed by the extension of deadline and were waiting for a call to come out on the road.

About the South Waziristan Agency operation, the Jamaat leader said tribesmen were ready to take up arms if given a go-ahead. “But this is agenda of the enemy and we would not act on it even though we are not being allowed to visit the operation area.”

The MMA won a majority of seats from the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA) in the general election last year, but its parliamentary delegation is being denied access to the South Waziristan Agency where the army is conducting an operation against alleged Al Qaeda and Taliban remnants.

Asked if NWFP minister Sirajul Haq who was elected as the provincial Amir of the Jamaat the other day could be disqualified under the Political Parties Ordinance 2002 which barred a person from holding party and government offices simultaneously, the JI secretary-general said no, adding that the law was applicable only at the national level. When he was told that the law was applicable even at the district level, he said the office of a provincial JI Amir was not important enough to become objectionable in the eyes of law.