LAHORE, May 22: Ruling PML president Chaudhry Shujaat Husain does not give importance to former Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali meeting Pir Pagara or the spiritual leader’s decision to move the Election Commission with the request that all but his faction be stopped from using the Pakistan Muslim League nomenclature.

Two representatives of the PML (Functional), Sheikh Sirajuddin and Kashif Nizamani, are scheduled to submit an application with the Chief Election Commissioner in Islamabad on Monday.

Before proceeding to the federal capital, the two met the estranged PML leader, Mian Mohammad Azhar, senior vice-president Mian Manzoor Wattoo and Ahmed Saeed Kirmani in Lahore and reportedly told them about the move.

They also informed them about the plan to hold a convention in Karachi next month under the chairmanship of Pir Pagara to bring all factions under the umbrella of the PML. The ruling party’s representatives would be extended invitation for participation, Sheikh Siraj told Dawn on Sunday.

He said PML-N leader Mian Nawaz Sharif would be approached for the purpose. There are also reports that Mr Jamali, who has left for Saudi Arabia to perform Ummrah, will try to contact the exiled former prime minister in Jeddah.

Chaudhry Shujaat, while talking to this reporter, said that he would present his party’s point of view when the PML (Functional) moved the Election Commission to “monopolize” the party nomenclature. However, he said that at a meeting at Karachi’s Kingri House on Nov 1 last year, Pir Pagara had addressed him (Shujaat) as ‘my leader’.

He said that Pir Pagara had first merged his faction with the ruling PML, but then revived the same as a separate entity. He said that the Election Commission was in a better position to decide the controversy.