LAHORE, July 20: ARD President Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan says Gen Musharraf should take back the Legal Framework Order in the same “unconstitutional manner” in which he had promulgated it in the first place, insisting that the rescinding of the controversial package of constitutional amendments will not cause any void.

Talking to Dawn here on Sunday, he said Gen Musharraf was wrong in his assertion that the withdrawal of the LFO would annul the entire electoral process or that the existing assemblies would cease to exist.

The chief opposition leader said in fact Gen Musharraf was conveying the nation a message that if pressed to withdraw the LFO, he would wind up the entire system.

The Nawabzada said opposition parties wanted the nascent political system to stay intact and it was for this reason that they had recognized the existing assemblies despite the “fact” that the elections had been massively rigged at every stage.

Asked if the withdrawal of the LFO would not pulverise the National Assembly speaker’s ruling that the LFO was part of the Constitution, the octogenarian leader said the speaker’s verdict had become controversial on the very day when Prime Minister Jamali had said the government was willing to resume talks with the opposition to resolve the dispute.

The ARD president refused to accept the existing system as parliamentary democracy, saying it was the continuation of the army rule in which all powers rested with Gen Musharraf, not the prime minister.

The world, the Nawabzada said, was being misled into believing that democratic system stood restored and power transferred to the elected representatives after the last year’s general elections. Had the power been transferred, he argued, corps commanders would not have been taking decisions on all important issues even today.

In response to a question, the Nawabzada said if the LFO be assumed part of the Constitution, as Gen Musharraf and ruling PML-Q president Chaudhry Shujaat Husain insist, membership of all legislators stood disputed as they had explicitly stated that they had taken oath under the Constitution of which the LFO was not a part. He said their membership became questionable also on the ground that the Election Order under which the last year’s polls had been held, was yet to be ratified by parliament.

“This means that all legislators have been sitting illegally in assemblies for the past eight months”, the ARD leader said, refuting the ruling party’s claim about the status of the LFO.

In response to a question, the Nawabzada said when the prime minister told opposition parties to take back their no-trust motion against the NA deputy speaker and the government would resume talks on the LFO, it clearly meant that Mr Jamali had accepted the Legal Framework Order as controversial.

He said since there was difference of opinion between the prime minister and the president of the ruling party on the status of the LFO, the ARD did not want to waste any more time in waiting for talks with the government. Thus, he said, the ARD had called a meeting of heads of its components for July 25 to decide opposition’s future course of action. A day later, he said, the PML-N would host an all-party conference in Islamabad.

He believed that parties in the ARD and the MMA would adhere to their stand on the LFO and also launch a mass contact movement with a public meeting in Rawalpindi on Aug 14.