ISLAMABAD, Aug 1: Leaders of the Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD) held an informal meeting here on Monday and decided to constitute an eight-member committee to prepare a white paper highlighting the incidents of pre-poll rigging in the local government elections.

Talking to Dawn, PML-N information secretary Siddiqul Farooque said the ARD, through the white paper, would highlight anti-democratic and unconstitutional acts of the regime and the indifference of the Election Commission of Pakistan towards violation of the code of conduct by the government functionaries.

Mr Farooque said the eight-member committee had also been assigned the task of preparing the draft of a joint declaration for the all parties conference (APC), convened by the ARD on August 11 in Islamabad on the issue of the local government elections. Monday’s meeting was presided over by ARD chairman Makhdoom Amin Fahim.

It was attended by important leaders of the PPP and the PML-N, including Raja Zafarul Haq, Syed Zafar Ali Shah and Malik Hakmin Khan. The committee consists of PPP Senator Farhatullah Khan Babar, PML-N Senior Vice-President Syed Zafar Ali Shah, Siddiqul Farooque, PPP secretary general Raja Pervez Ashraf, PPP MNA Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari, Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, Mufti Ferozuddin Hazarvi and Aamir Mirza.