KARACHI, June 19: The extraordinary general body meeting of the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) has finally reduced the presidential term to one year from two-year.

A resolution in this regard was adopted on Saturday in a fiery general body meeting of the KCCI, which was marred by mismanagement, hooliganism and exchange of filthy words among KCCI members.

The meeting (requisitioned) of the KCCI held in the Majeed Bawany Auditorium considered the following draft resolution.

"Resolved that the term of the office of the President of the Chamber be reduced from two years to one year and consequent upon amendment in Article 32(C), necessary changes (if any), in all the relevant affected clauses be made."

The Chair explained the procedure and mechanism of conducting the meeting. The ruling which the Chair gave, is reproduced here below: "Those members who are against the proposed resolution shall sign the registers placed in the office of the Secretary to prove over 25 per cent which is not visible. Otherwise, the resolution shall stand adopted."

A group of businessmen led by Tariq Saeed, S.M. Munir, Shahzada Alam, Capt Moiz Khan, Capt Haleem Siddiqui emerged to counter the move for maintaining the president tenure for two years, but their efforts proved futile.

The KCCI's general body meeting, summoned for curtailing the president tenure to two years from one year, gave a fish market look where rivals (supporting two years term) resorted to violent tactics.

President KCCI, Siraj Kassam Teli, in a statement, blamed the opponent groups for creating disturbances in the KCCI meeting. He claimed that despite rivals' efforts, 80pc members favoured one year term for presidentship.

He said the meeting then passed a ruling, requesting opponents (20 per cent in majority favouring two year term) to sign in the register, placed at the KCCI's secretary office, otherwise, in case of non-compliance, it would be considered in favour of one year term.

Teli said that some opposition members, led by Captain Halim Siddiqui (accompanied by his armed guards), Shahzada Alam, Shaheen Ilyas Sarwana, Capt Moiz Khan, etc., broke the door of secretary's office. Under such unfavourable circumstances, the opponents took away the register with them in which only 8-10 members could register their signatures.

As a result of this, a resolution was passed by the Chamber that the new KCCI chief would be elected for one year term only from the new election 2004-2005 instead of two years.