ISLAMABAD, May 2: Several opposition members protested in the National Assembly on Wednesday against free handover to a non-governmental organisation (NGO) of a plot of land in Islamabad’s main Fatima Jinnah Park that was earlier offered to the education ministry to build a public library.

Minister of State for Education Anisazeb Tahirkheli, responding to a call-attention notice from nine opposition members, confirmed that the possession of the plot had been given to the Nazriya Pakistan Council headed by a local newspaper owner and chief editor, Zahid Malik, on a 33-year lease and said Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz had ordered the education ministry to build the proposed public library at some other “appropriate place”.

But Malik Allahyar Khan, chairman of the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee, contested the minister’s version, saying the library would still be built at the same site although the NGO would only construct what will be called Aiwan-i-Quaid as a monument to the father of the nation, Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah.

Ms Tahirkheli said the plot’s possession was given in September 2004 but the matter was taken up by the prime minister after some “lacunas” were pointed out later.

In a meeting with the council in May 2005, she said, the prime minister ordered that the library be built at another site either in the same park or a proposed cultural complex and that the construction of Aiwan-i-Quaid by the NGO was now under way.

The opposition members, including PPP’s Nayyar Hussain Bokhari and Azra Fazal Pechuho and Pashtunkhawa Milli Awami Party chief Mahmood Khan Achakzai, accused the prime minister of handing over a 4,100 square yard plot as well as making grant of money to one of his favourites and one of them called the NGO dubious.