ISLAMABAD, Oct 27: The ruling troika held a brainstorming session with its aides on Friday on devising a strategy that could win the coalition the general elections next year, Dawn has learnt.

Sources privy to the four-and-a-half-hour meeting of President Gen Pervez Musharraf, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and Pakistan Muslim League chief Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said the meeting decided that the ruling coalition would jointly contest the poll.

All the coalition partners were represented at the meeting except for the Muttahida Qaumi Movement.

Prominent among those who attended the meeting were chief ministers of Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan, governor of the North West Frontier Province, former president Farooq Leghari, Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri, Hamid Nasir Chattha, Manzoor Wattoo, Engineer Amir Muqam, Sardar Yar Mohammad Rind and Mushahid Hussain Syed.

Addressing the participants, President Musharraf said he was committed to transparent and free election process, adding that the Election Commission would be fully empowered to ensure that.

“Basically it was a consultative meeting held to discuss some important issues like what is happening in Balochistan and North and South Waziristan,” according to one participant.

He quoted Gen Musharraf as saying that he wanted to take into confidence the people of troubled parts of Balochistan and NWFP by bringing them to mainstream politics.

The president asked the prime minister and Chaudhry Shujaat to forge better understanding with allies with a view to reaching consensus on women protection bill which, he said, should be positively presented in the next session of the National Assembly.

The president stressed that the federation needed to be strengthened and law and order situation improved. Both these issues must be matters of utmost importance to the government, he said.