ISLAMABAD, May 30: The next meeting for unification of six smaller factions of Pakistan Muslim League has been fixed for June 4 here, PML (Quaid-i-Azam) Joint Secretary Azim Chaudhry told Dawn on Wednesday.

Earlier, a meeting of leaders of the factions on May 27 at Lahore had remained inconclusive on details of the unification.

The parties involved in talks for unification are: PML(QA), PML (Functional) of Pir Pagaro, PML (Junejo) of Hamid Naser Chattha, PML (Jinnah-Wattoo), PML (Jinnah-Azad bin Haider), PML (Qasim) of Saifullah Saif and PML (Qayum) of Amanullah Khan.

The unification committee’s convener, PML(QA) Secretary-General Gohar Ayub Khan held a brief meeting with PML (Nawaz) Chairman Raja Zafarul Haq on Wednesday.

Zafarul Haq told the PML(QA) leader that he was leaving for abroad and he would be available in the country on June 3, after which the date for the unification meeting was changed to June 4.

The schedule was said to have been changed so that more consultations could be attempted with the Nawaz group’s chairman before the formal unification meeting.

After failure of the initiative of reunification of various PML factions, a loose coalition among them is being emphasised, sources close to the parties said. Under the plan, all factions will keep their organizational set-up intact while uniting to contest next polls with the same symbol.

The big hurdle in merger of the factions reportedly is the stress of PML(QA) on keeping the party organization under Mian Azhar intact while other factions’ leaders want it changed through elections.

The efforts for the unification initiated to combat the Nawaz faction of the party had failed in the early stage when Pir Pagaro and Hamid Nasir Chattha opposed Mian Azhar’s retaining the party’s top post.