ISLAMABAD, March 25: President Gen Pervez Musharraf on Friday expressed displeasure at the working of the ruling coalition’s parliamentarians and asked them to ensure quorum in both houses of parliament. He said it was surprising that in the presence of 139 federal ministers, ministers of state and parliamentary secretaries, 86 members could not be produced during the proceedings of the lower house. Speaking to MPs of the ruling coalition at his camp office, he said the government was providing all possible perks and privileges to them and it was their duty to do what was expected of them.

He advised them to follow the strategy chalked out by Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Mushahid Hussain Syed for maintaining quorum.

He assured the treasury MPs that none of the exiled leaders, Nawaz Sharif, Shahbaz Sharif or Benazir Bhutto, would be allowed to return home till 2007, the year of general election.

He said there should be no fears about Pakistan’s nuclear assets going into the hands of extremists and said: “We have put in place a strong command and control system in the presence of which even an external attack cannot hurt our assets.”

President Musharraf said the government was determined to root out terrorism, religious fanaticism and sectarian extremism and asked the MPs to play their role in achieving the objective.

He asked the coalition partners to get ready for the forthcoming local government elections which he assured would be held on schedule.

The president said that parliamentarians were leaders of the people in their own right and “a leader is one who takes the people behind him instead of following them”.

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, PML president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, and parliamentary leaders of PPP (Patriots) and MQM were also present.

According to insiders, the president expressed displeasure over rejection of a bill presented in the National Assembly by Kashmala Tariq to amend the law on honour killing.

He, however, said the legislator should have taken the parliamentary party into confidence before introducing the piece of legislation on which the PPP Parliamentarians was also willing to lend support.

He said the greatest challenge was to promote and adopt the strategy of enlightened moderation introduced by him so that the misconception that Pakistan was a hotbed of terrorism could be removed.

Talking about economy, the president acknowledged that in the process of gaining higher growth, “inflation also jumps up and creates price hike”.

He, however, asserted that the oil import bill had become too heavy and the government was unable to keep subsidizing petroleum products. He said the federal and provincial governments had done little to keep check on prices of essential commodities which were increasing the burden on the common man.