PESHAWAR, Dec 29: The Awami National Party (ANP) has decided that it will not vote for President Pervez Musharraf who is set to seek vote of confidence from the parliament and four provincial assemblies under the 17th Constitution Amendment Bill.

The ANP leadership at a high-level meeting held here on Monday with the party chief Asfandyar Wali Khan in the chair decided not to vote for President Musharraf terming the intended move on the part of the federal government to seek a vote of confidence for the president as illegal and against the Constitution.

“There is no provision in the Constitution for the president to take vote of confidence from the parliament, hence, the intended move would be ultra constitution and not valid,” said party’s provincial chief Begum Nasim Wali during a press conference here on Monday.

Begum Nasim, who addressed the press conference in place of the party chief after he had to rush back to Islamabad to attend Senate’s session, said the party’s high-level meeting attended by the senior leadership and general secretaries and presidents of all the four provincial organizations of the party unanimously decided that it would not extend vote of confidence to the president in uniform.

The Pukhtun nationalist force has seven representatives in the NWFP assembly and two in the senate. Initially, it had 10 representatives in the provincial assembly but the number got down to seven after it expelled three of its MPAs for violating party’s discipline in the last held Senate elections.

“Being a secular and democratic party and in the light of its principled stand adopted on different occasions in the past, ANP has decided not to vote for President Musharraf because a civil servant cannot hold the office of the president,” said Begum Wali.

ANP, she said, was supportive of several of the provisions contained in the Legal Framework Order like the provision asking for increase in the number of seats in parliament, allocating seats for women, reduction in the age limit of voters, etc.