February 25, 2008	Monday	Safar 17, 1429

QUETTA, Feb 24: The Pakistan Muslim League (Q) has said that it has the right to form government in Balochistan, being the largest group in the provincial assembly.

However, the Balochistan National Party (Awami) said the post of chief minister should go to a representative from the Makran belt.

Senator Saeed Hashimi of the PML-Q told newsmen after a meeting of the party’s newly elected legislators here on Sunday that its parliamentary leader would be named in three days.

He said that being the largest group in the assembly, PML-Q had the right to form government.

He denied existence of a ‘forward bloc’ in the parliamentary group and said the PML-Q was in contact with its former allies and independent members.

Former chief ministers Jam Mohammad Yousuf and Nawab Zulfiqar Ali Magsi, Jaffar Khan Mandokhel, Mir Asim Kurd, Sardar Masood Luni, Sardar Mohammad Khan Tor and two independent MPAs-elect

— Agha Irfan and Mir

Rustam Jamali — attended the meeting.

Mir Asadullah Baloch of the BNP-A said Syed Ehsan Shah would be in party’s parliamentary leader and a candidate from Makran would get the opportunity to serve as chief minister.

He said the BNP-A had supported the government led by the PML-Q after the election in 2002 and he hoped that PML-Q would reciprocate the gesture.

MPA-elect from Khuzdar, Sardar Aslam Bizenjo, said a meeting of independent members elected to the Balochistan Assembly would be held to work out a plan for cooperating with the group which accepted their demands.

However, he made it clear that they would not support any party involved in the killing of nationalist leaders Nawab Akbar Bugti, Nawabzada Balaach Marri and other innocent Baloch people during military operations.

A meeting of the provincial executive committee of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam, presided over by Maulana Mohammad Khan Sherani, which began on Saturday night, continued till Sunday evening. The committee is likely to name the party’s parliamentary leader in the assembly.

Both the PML-Q and the People’s Party Parliamentarians have expedited their efforts to muster support of other parties and independent MPAs for forming the government in the province.