KARACHI: On his 56th birthday on Saturday, Syed Murad Ali Shah was formally nominated by the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) to lead its provincial government for a third straight term in Sindh as chief minister.

The party also finalised the names of Agha Siraj Durrani and Rehana Leghari as speaker and deputy speaker of the provincial assembly, respectively.

The PPP’s deputy speaker in the last two provincial assemblies, Syeda Shehla Raza, has not been allowed to have a hat-trick in the post despite the fact that she will be part of the upcoming Sindh Assembly as a member elected on reserved seat.

Bilawal nominates Agha Siraj Durrani and Rehana Leghari for posts of speaker and deputy speaker

During a meeting of the parliamentary party, PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari announced the nominations for the top positions in the next government, warning that the key slots were not meant for lifetime and only performance would decide the fate of the legislators.

“PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has nominated Murad Ali Shah, Agha Sirajuddin Durrani and Rehana Leghari as the party’s candidates for the slots of chief minister, speaker and deputy speaker of Sindh Assembly at a meeting of PPP Parliamentary Party presided over by him on Saturday,” said a statement issued from Bilawal House after the meeting.

Keeping his focus solely on the next government in Sindh, the PPP chairman during his address to the newly-elected parliamentarians of the party also hinted at his priorities in the province with a caution to party members of the provincial assembly to “get ready for more transparent and merit-based governance to deliver to the people”.

“The PPP chairman stressed that issues of water scarcity, improvement in health and education sectors should be the top priorities of the new Sindh government,” said the statement, adding that there would be no lifetime chief minister or ministers as he himself would be monitoring their performances, including of MPAs.

Mr Bhutto-Zardari’s ideas about the future government reflect his personal strategy in the province, as many think in the days to come the PPP chairman could be seen to be more active and directly involved in the provincial government’s matters to ensure a better performance of the party. His speech to the Sindh legislators gave scarce details about his future engagement in the province for the next five years, however.

Party leaders believe that the young chairman — who will turn 30 in September and took a lead over other parties by announcing his candidate for the office of Sindh CM well before the official announcement on Saturday — would now focus more on affairs of Sindh governance while leading the party on opposition benches in the National Assembly.

Reiterating his stance on the July 25 general elections, he said that a “group of puppets” were “inducted” both in Sindh and the Centre and vowed to continue the struggle for strengthening democracy and parliament.

The statement quoted the chairman as saying that various “puppets were cobbled up together” to challenge the PPP in Sindh in the 2018 elections but they were defeated with the support of the people.

“He said that another group of puppets was being inducted in the federal government but pledged that the PPP would expose their hollowness as well and rout them out,” the statement said.

Published in Dawn, August 12th, 2018