May 4, 2006	Thursday	Rabi-us-Sani 5, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, May 3: Dissidents in the ruling PML met here on Wednesday for the second time in a week and expressed frustration over the way the party was being run in ‘violation’ of its constitution.

The meeting was held at a hotel and was attended by, among others, senior vice-president Gen (retd) Majeed Malik, Hamid Nasir Chattha, Syed Kabir Wasti, Sen Nisar Memon, Iqbal Dar and Azim Chaudhry.

A meeting held earlier at the residence of Gen Majeed Malik was also attended by Gohar Ayub Khan, Salim Saifullah Khan and Mian Manzoor Wattoo. The latter part of the meeting was attended also by the party president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain.

Kabir Wasti told this correspondent that the group had urged President Gen Pervez Musharraf to meet party legislators individually because that was the only way he could get the true picture about the party affairs. He said in this way, the president was told, he could assess the situation caused by the inactivity of the party leadership.

He said he and some party veterans believed that Gen Musharraf should resign from the post of the chief of the army staff before contesting the 2007 elections to give the polls a semblance of fairness. In Mr Wasti’s opinion, if Gen Musharraf shed his army chief’s uniform, he could win the vote of liberal and progressive-minded sections even in the opposition parties.

Mr Wasti said that people advising Gen Musharraf to retain his army uniform were political orphans and worn-out politicians. He said that if Gen Musharraf accepted their advice and conducted elections as president-in-uniform, the polls would be controversial. In that case, he added, people would demand fresh elections whenever he decided to leave the COAS office.

Urging President Musharraf to seek a ‘second opinion’ about the way the party was being run, the dissidents said that the party’s constitution was being bypassed, adding that no efforts were being made to strengthen internal party institutions like the central working committee, general council and executive committee. They said that all party decisions were being taken by some individuals who had no power to do so.

They decided to separately meet all legislators who were scheduled to meet the president to brief him on the party’s affairs.

The party leaders said that the president was being given a false picture about the party, especially the way its was being run in Punjab.