ISLAMABAD, March 23: Majority of the Pakistan Muslim League- Nawaz (PML-N) leaders on Thursday reached London to attend a meeting of the party’s Central Working Committee (CWC) scheduled to be held on Saturday and Sunday. The meeting was convened by PML-N chief and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif three weeks ago after finailzing the names of new members of the CWC.

The PML-N chief will preside over the CWC meeting of his party after a lapse of seven years as last time Mr Sharif presided over the meeting in March 1999, seven months before the dismissal of his government on October 12, 1999. The PML-N leader arrived in London in January this year after spending five years in exile in Saudi Arabia.

Sources told Dawn on Thursday that majority of the PML-N leaders had already arrived in London while a few of them would be leaving for the UK on Friday.

PML-N Chairman Raja Zafarul Haq and secretary_general Iqbal Zafar Jhagra had departed for London last week while president of the party’s NWFP chapter and former chief minister Pir Sabir Shah, Senator Sardar Mahtab Abbasi, information secretary Siddiqul Farooque and vice-president Syed Zafar Ali Shah arrived in the UK on Thursday.

Former minister Sardar Yaqoob Khan Nasir, PML-N Islamabad president Dr Tariq Chaudhry, Maimoona Hashmi, Tehmina Daultana, vice-president Mushahidullah Khan, Saranjam Zamindar and Raja Afzal also left Islamabad for London on Thursday.

Acting parliamentary leader of the PML-N in the National Assembly Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan is expected to depart for the UK by Friday.

Some of the party leaders had gone to the UK from Lahore and Karachi.

PML-N MNA from Lahore Khawaja Saad Rafiq will not be able to attend the meeting as he is presently in police custody on charges of rioting.

It may be mentioned here that Mr Sharif approved the names of the new members of the party’s CWC some three weeks ago and the names were announced by Mr Jhagra at a press conference.

The members of the PML-N CWC are Mian Nawaz Sharif, Ghulam Dastagir Khan, M. Hamza, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Mohammad Ishaq Dar, Raja Mohammad Afzal, Mian Mohammad Zaman, Chaudhry Sher Ali, Sheikh Aftab Ahmed, Imdad Ali Chandio, Rana Tanveer Hussain, Chaudhry Asadur Rehman, Inamullah Khan Niazi, Maimoona Hashmi, Rana Sanaullah, Khawaja Saad Rafiq, Mahmood Ahmed Khan, Zain Ansari, Rana Noorul Hassan, Sadia Abbasi, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Khudai Noor, Nasir Khan, Sartaj Aziz and Khawaja Mohammad Asif.

The central office-bearers of the party, provincial presidents and general secretaries and presidents of the eight central wings of the party are ex-officio members of the CWC.