LAHORE, July 7: The PML-N says voters want to see three major opposition parties — the PML-N itself, the PPP and the Jamaat-i-Islami — joining hands for giving a tough time to the ‘ruling opportunists’ in the local polls. Party leader Khwaja Ahmad Hassaan, the former Data Ganj Bakhsh town nazim, hopes that if no electoral adjustments could be made at the union council level, at least a one-to-one fight will be seen at town and district levels in the city as contacts among elders of the three parties are going on.

Differences among the opposition parties at the UC level will not be as harmful as is being considered because the ruling PML is also not organized and multiple panels of its activists will be in the field, he says. These panels will affect the PML votebank and not the opposition’s, he adds.

The Khwaja says (MMA’s) Hafiz Salman Butt, (PPP’s) Haji Azizur Rahman Chan and he himself have initiated a major campaign to make maximum adjustments at the UC level.

“Even workers (of the three parties) are coming up with formations accommodating one another for the seats of nazim, naib nazim and councillors. Many a joint panel of the opposition will crop up as a result of these efforts, he believes.

He further says “most of the panels formed by them are at least acceptable to us.”

The experience of contesting jointly in the bypolls for NA-127 has had a positive effect on the attitude of the PPP, the PML-N and the MMA workers and now they are more willing to accommodate one another, he says.

The PML-N, which is putting up candidates under the umbrella of the Sharif Qiadat, has received applications of at least two panels for each of the 150 UCs in Lahore.

MNAs and MPAs have been given a free hand to nominate panels in a decentralized process. In case of complaints that genuine workers have been ignored, a city board, comprising Khwaja Ahmad Hassaan, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Pervaiz Malik, Mian Mujtaba Shujaur Rahman and others, will finalize the candidates.

The Khwaja is sanguine that the PML-N will claim 70-plus seats of nazims/naib nazims provided the election will be free and fair.

In the 2000 polls, the party had won 45 slots despite a ‘planned defeat’ of the nominees who could have become trouble makers.

The PML-N claims that major urban areas comprising Ravi, Data Ganj Bakhsh, Samanabad, Gulberg and Shalamar towns are its strongholds.

It is introducing mostly new faces because several old ones had switched loyalties and joined the ruling PML. However, it does not expect that the factor will (negatively) affect the results.

“The masses abhor turncoats and will show their reaction in the local-body polls,” says the former nazim, who also claims that political giants of yesterday have become dwarfs today while the once immature candidates are now considered heavyweights of local politics.

He strongly believes that a level playing-field will be provided to every party if Gen Musharraf, according to his stance, wants to allow the masses a chance for accountability of corrupt nazims.

Going door to door will be the basic canvassing strategy of the PML-N, though corner meetings will also be scheduled. “We want to convey our message to the voters while keeping a low profile and avoiding much drum beating.”

The Khwaja says that while deciding joint contestants of the opposition at town and district levels personal credentials of the hopefuls will also be considered besides the score (of a party at the UC level).

The party is going to finalize its list of candidates by the end of next week.

About accommodating former Punjab secretary-general Khwaja Saad Rafiq’s group in the distribution of tickets, he says all are unanimous at the decision to be taken by Mian Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif. “There can be no two opinions on it.”