KARACHI, Oct 15: The Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) has so far received no formal reply from the government to its demand that General Musharraf should give a date to relinquish the office of the army chief.

The MMA President, Allama Shah Ahmed Noorani, told PPI on Wednesday that once an acceptable date was given, two of the agreeable contentious points in the LFO would be incorporated in the constitution amendment bill to be presented in the National Assembly.

Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali and PML chief Chaudhary Shujaat Hussain had told MMA leaders that a formal reply to its demands would be provided in writing after Mr Jamali’s return home from the United States, Maulana Noorani recalled.

No formal contact has been made by the government in this regard, he added.

The MMA chief pointed out that he had convened a meeting of the MMA’s Supreme Council in Islamabad on Thursday (Oct 16) to discuss the report of 11 MNAs, belonging to the MMA, who were on a fact-finding mission in Vana, South Waziristan, where a military operation was under way for the past many days.

Maulana Noorani claimed that a curfew-like situation prevailed in the tribal area.

People of the area, he added, were subjected to a crackdown and strict checking by the Pakistan army personnel as a result of which bazaars were lying closed and the local people were suffering losses.

Describing the situation ‘serious’, he said that the MMA’s Supreme Council would decide future course of action in Thursday’s meeting after reviewing the MNAs’ report.—PPI