26 July 2004	Monday	08 Jamadi-us-Saani 1425

KARACHI, July 25: The Sindh Assembly is set to witness yet another round of uproarious scenes when it goes into a hurriedly called session at 9:30am on Monday.

The opposition Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal has vowed to lodge protest and stage walkout against administering oath to an MQM candidate got declared MPA-elect through litigation.

The administering of oath to Mr Yusuf Munir Shaikh of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement has been included in the agenda of the session. Mr Shaikh contested the seat, fallen vacant following the assassination of PPP MPA Abdullah Murad, against Mr Omar Jatt of the Pakistan People's Party in the May 12 by-election for PS-127 Malir constituency.

However, the result of the by-election was withheld, and later scrapped, by the election commission on the representation made by the opposition. Fresh by-polls were ordered and August 9 was fixed.

In the meantime, a constitutional petition was filed by the MQM in the Sindh High Court against the election commission's decision. The high court ruled in favour of the petitioners and the election commission issued the notification declaring Mr Shaikh, with 41,117 votes, elected from PS-127.

The MMA said it would move Supreme Court against the high court's verdict. Maulana Omar Sadiq, MMA's parliamentary party leader in the assembly, said on Monday that the alliance would register its protest when the house would take up the fourth item on the session's agenda - administering oath to the newly notified MPA.

He question the justification for summoning the assembly session on a short notice. "It appears that all this exercise (of convening PA session) is aimed at administering oath to Yusuf Munir Shaikh before we could move the Supreme Court and seek stay against the high court ruling," said the MMA leader.

Although, a joint strategy could not be evolved for Monday's session by the opposition parties, the parliamentary parties would be meeting at 8:30am, one hour before the start of the session to discuss the strategy.

The parliamentary party of the coalition has also scheduled its meeting, to be presided over by leader of the house Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim at 8:30am on Monday. The meeting will be held in the chief minister's chamber at the assembly building.

Maulana Omar Sadiq expressed the hope that all members of the opposition benches would record their protest and stage a walkout when the chair announced taking up item no. 4, administering oath to Mr Shaikh.

The other items on the agenda of Monday's session are question hour, adjournment motions, announcement of assent given by the governor for the bills passed by the assembly, and consideration of the government bill number 2 of 2004 to amend the Information Technology Ordinance-2002.

Sindh Assembly Secretary Hadi Bux Buriro told Dawn late on Sunday that the secretariat had, so far, received no adjournment motion. However, he added, a motion could be furnished to the secretariat one hour before the start of the proceedings.