PESHAWAR, July 11: The organisational crisis in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter of Pakistan Muslim League-Q is likely to deepen as many of the senior leaders are not ready to accept Syed Qasim Shah as new provincial chief of the party, according to sources.

A number of senior leaders of the party, pleading anonymity, told Dawn that they were consulted by the leadership about nomination of provincial president. They said that they would adopt a wait and see policy for few weeks to get response from the central leadership.

Source said that some of the key leaders of PML-Q in Hazara might quit the party in reaction to appointment of the new provincial president. The central leadership, source added, was bound to announce provincial general secretary and information secretary to remove doubts but it further complicated the situation.

PML-Q suffered a setback in the province when its provincial chief Eng Amir Muqam joined PML-N on April 6. Since then its leadership has been unable to find a suitable person to re-organise the party in the province.

Most of its important leaders have already quit the party and the remaining want to get the main slots in the province. The central leadership has also not paid proper attention to the provincial chapter of the party rather it avoids visiting the province.

The leadership of PML-Q had formed a 13-member committee to reorganise different units and submit report to the party but it instead suggested that names of new office-bearers should be announced by Chaudhry Shujaat and Mushahid Hussain.

The organising committee did not show any performance, however, provincial organiser Nighat Orakzai succeeded in holding a convention on May 1 at Nishtar Hall, where she invited Chaudhry Shujjaat Hussain and also donated Rs100,000 for labourers from her pocket but she could not draw attention of the leadership.

Interestingly, the party’s provincial council also seems dormant otherwise it has the authority to play a role by giving suggestions for appointment of different office-bearers.

Sources said that central leadership of the party took no interest in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as it had focused attention only on Punjab. That’s why the new provincial president was appointed without taking the provincial council into confidence, they added.

PML-Q central vice president Intikhab Chamkani, when contacted, said that as per traditions provincial general secretary should be chosen from the Pakhtun belt as the new president was from Hazara division.

He expressed the hope that Qasim Shah would try to reorganise the party in the province as he was a senior politician.

However, PML-Q former provincial general secretary Mushtaq Ahmed Ghani said that he did not want to comment on the party’s situation. He said that all the political parties were busy in strengthening their units but PML-Q was still disorganised.

He added that the new president had so far not contacted him.

Nighat Orakzai said that Syed Qasim Shah had so far not contacted her but being a party activist she would support Chaudhry’s decision. She complained that PML-Q MPAs were not provided sufficient funds for development of their constituencies and unrest existed among them.