LAHORE, Jan 21: PML-N parliamentary leader in the Punjab Assembly proposed on Saturday that an all-party conference should be convened by the rulers to suggest measures to conduct 2007 general elections in a free and fair manner.

Rana Sanaullah Khan said while talking to Dawn that the polls should be held under the supervision of an interim government, the composition of which should be decided in consultation with the opposition parties. He also demanded an independent and autonomous election commission to ensure transparency in the polls.

Mr Khan demanded the exiled leaders be allowed to come back and take part in the elections. Gen Pervez Musharraf, he said, should not be a candidate for another term, and the new assemblies should elect another head of the state.

Rana Sanaullah Khan was of the opinion that encouraged by Gen Musharraf’s decision to defer or abandon the Kalabagh Dam project, a number of regional parties would take part in the general elections. These parties, he said, thought that they had forced the general to take back a decision he had been insisting for long to implement. People would support these parties in their areas of influence, the PML-N leader viewed.

He said any government formed by regional parties would neither work nor was desirable. To counter them and to give the country a stable political system, Mr Khan said the national parties should be given a chance to play their role.

He believed that the situation would witness a qualitative change once Mian Nawaz Sharif, Mian Shahbaz Sharif and Ms Benazir Bhutto were allowed to come back and take part in the general elections.

But if Gen Musharraf decided to contest the next election with the ruling PML support, he said, the situation would not improve.

He said the consequences would be disastrous in case the rulers continued their efforts to fragment the PPP and PML-N.