ISLAMABAD, April 10: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) boycotted the election of the public accounts committee (PAC) chairman in its first meeting here on Saturday, sources told Dawn.

The sources said the only MQM member in the committee, Kunwar Khalid Younus, attended the meeting and lodged his protest for not taking his party into confidence regarding the election of Malik Allahyar Khan of the Pakistan Muslim League-Q as the PAC chairman.

Mr Younus, the sources said, complained that the government had promised to give the chairmanship of the PAC and some other important committees to the MQM. However, the PML-Q changed its decision at a later stage and that too without taking the other coalition parties into confidence, the sources quoted him as saying in the meeting.

Soon after a short speech, the MQM member walked out of the meeting in protest and was not present at the time of the election of the chairman. Later, Mr Younus left here for Karachi.

The meeting was attended by only two opposition MNAs of the People's Party Parliamentarians (PPP) Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi and Syed Qurban Ali Shah. Syed Naveed Qamar could not turn up for the meeting. Similarly, Hafiz Hussain Ahmed and Liaquat Baloch of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) and Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan of the PML-N were also not present in the meeting.

After the MQM member walked out of the meeting, some government members went to bring him back but all their efforts went in vain.

The sources said after the MQM member's walkout, PPP's Shah Mehmood Qureshi criticized the "double-standards" of the MQM. He said on the one hand, the MQM was a part of the government and federal cabinet and, on the other, it was lodging protest with the government. The MQM, he said, had adopted this attitude to blackmail the government to get more benefits.

When contacted, Mr Younus neither confirmed nor denied the report that he had boycotted the elections. "I am in Karachi and I will be back in Islamabad next week and then I will disclose the details," he added.

Meanwhile, Malik Allahyar Khan, a PML-Q MNA from Attock, was elected as the PAC chairman. The name of Malik Allah Yar Khan, who is a professional lawyer, was proposed by Ghulam Sarwar Khan and seconded by Chaudhry Safdar Shakir. Mr Khan was also MNA from 1962 to 1965. He served as minister for labour and jails from 1966 to 1969.

Mr Khan was also member of the Punjab Assembly and served as provincial minister for revenue, local government, labour and mineral development from 1985 to 1988. The next meeting of the PAC will be held on April 16 in which the auditor-general is expected to give briefing to the members.