March 2, 2006	Thursday	Safar 1, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, March 1: Leaders of the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD) have written separate letters to the National Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain and acting Chief Election Commissioner Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar to ensure presence of the jailed opposition members in the National Assembly at the time of Senate polls.

Parliamentary Secretary of the ARD Izhar Amrohvi told Dawn that these letters had been written by the Alliance chairman, Makhdoom Amin Fahim, PML-N chairman Raja Zafarul Haq and People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) secretary-general Raja Pervez Ashraf.

Mr Amrohvi said that Amin Fahim had sent letters to both the speaker as well as the acting CEC. Mr Ashraf sent letter to the speaker, while Mr Haq wrote a letter to the CEC.

In their letters, the ARD leaders asked the speaker and the acting CEC that acting president of the PML-N, Makhdoom Javed Hashmi, and Khwaja Saad Rafiq, who were also sitting MNAs, should be allowed to attend the National Assembly session on March 10 when the MNAs would elect senators from the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) and Islamabad.

The ARD leaders are of the view that being sitting MNAs, it is the democratic and constitutional right of the two PML-N MNAs to cast their votes in the Senate poll. Both Mr Hashmi and Mr Rafiq are in Kot Lakhpat Jail, Lahore, on different charges.

Mr Hashmi is in jail on the charge of committing treason, while Mr Rafiq was arrested from Islamabad on the charge of inciting people to violence during the protest demonstration in Lahore on February 14 against the publication of the blasphemous sketches in Europe.

The ARD leaders have asked the speaker to issue production orders of the two jailed MNAs under the rules.