23 August 2004	Monday	06 Rajab 1425

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ISLAMABAD, Aug 22: The Alliance for Restoration of Democracy is still undecided about its candidate against Shaukat Aziz for the post of prime minister, whereas the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal is firm on its decision to boycott the election process.

The PPP Parliamentarians are insisting that their president and ARD chairman Makhdoom Amin Fahim should be the candidate while the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) wants Makhdoom Javed Hashmi as the consensus candidate since the MMA has also announced its support for him.

Mr Fahim, who is in Karachi, informed party spokesman Senator Farhatullah Babar by telephone that any decision about alliance's candidate would be made by the ARD high command in its meeting on Tuesday.

Mr Babar told Dawn that since the government was also delaying the announcement of the schedule for the PM's election, the ARD was also taking time to reach a unanimous decision.

When contacted for comment, MMA's deputy secretary-general Liaquat Baloch said the religious alliance had made preliminary contacts with the leaders of the ARD parties, including Mr Fahim and Khwaja Saad Rafiq, but no concrete proposals had come to fore.

He said the alliance was determined not to reverse its decision of boycotting the electoral process since in its opinion it would be wrong to take part in it after opposing Mr Aziz's nomination and the way he had won in the by-polls.

He said, the MMA was committed to supporting Javed Hashmi if he was fielded as a candidate since "we have all been demanding an order to produce him in parliament.

Meanwhile, the parliamentary group of the ruling coalition will also meet on Monday afternoon with Prime Minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain in the chair to finalize the election schedule which will most probably be announced on Wednesday. Because of visits to Islamabad by Afghan and Bosnian presidents this week it was expected the prime ministerial election will be held on Aug 27.