LAHORE, July 24: The PML-N is inviting applications from potential candidates for the coming general elections from Aug 1. A top official of the party told Dawn on Tuesday that a decision to this effect was taken during the recent multi-party conference organised by the PML-N in London.

He said aspirants for National Assembly seats would send their applications to the central parliamentary board and for provincial assemblies to the provincial boards.

A seven-member com-

mittee under the chair of Raja Zafarul Haq has been formed which will visit next week all the provincial chiefs to discuss their reports about potential candidates.

District coordination committees, set up this January for preparing suggestions about the aspirants, have already begun submitting their reports to the committee.

Shahbaz Sharif, chief of the Lahore coordination committee, was the first to present his report.

Other members of the committee are: Iqbal Zafar Jhaggra, Saranjam Khan, Ghulam Dastgir Khan, Mushahidullah Khan, Imdad Chandio and Nazeer Swati.

Award of tickets will be finalized after announcement of the election schedule and on the basis of aspirants’ performance in the anti-Musharraf drive the party is planning to intensify through the All-Party Democratic Movement, he added.

The official said the performance condition was aimed at making the candidates to mobilize maximum people for participating in the anti-government drive.

He said sitting MPs of the party might not necessarily be awarded tickets again. They, too, would have to prove their credentials, he added.