ISLAMABAD, Oct 28: Maulana Shah Ahmed Noorani, chief of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, has invited five parties with maximum number of seats in the National Assembly for talks on Tuesday to hammer out a joint strategy on constitutional package and transfer of power.

The parties invited to the meeting included Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-i-Azam), People’s Party Parliamentarians, Pakistan Muslim League-N and National Alliance, with MMA being the host.

Meanwhile, discussions on the formation of government among the leaders of PML-Q, MMA, National Alliance and ARD resumed on Monday.

A PML-Q team led by its parliamentary party leader Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain held a second round of talks with the MMA top brass at the residence of Maulana Shah Ahmed Noorani and decided to continue parleys on Tuesday. The PML-Q team included Mir Zafarullah Jamali, Iftikhar Gilani and Majeed Malik.

Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan, chief of ARD, also met the MMA leadership to convince them on forming a coalition with PPP and PML-N.

The National Alliance chief Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi visited the MMA leaders and held talks on issues relating to peaceful transfer of power and role of the alliance in the new setup.

The MMA leadership also held lengthy discussions to resolve issues facing the alliance and give a final shape to its parleys with other parties.

Briefing newsmen after the PML-Q-MMA talks, Maulana Noorani said: “We held discussions on all issues relating to the formation of government. We demand that the National Assembly session be convened without further delay.”

Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said: “We are yet to resolve the issue of prime ministerial candidate but there is no deadlock either and talks are going ahead satisfactorily”.

Maulana Noorani said there was no hurdle in convening the assembly session as a gazette notification declaring the names of successful candidates had been issued.

He said: “We held frank discussions and listened to each other’s point of view. We will resume our parleys tomorrow.”

The MMA chief said that both the sides were trying to reach an understanding, but “we are not in haste.”

He said the alliance stance on its candidate for the top slot was clear. However, he said, the MMA was more concerned about ensuring supremacy of parliament which should be above all other institutions and the PML-Q leaders were also of the same opinion.

On the occasion, the alliance’s candidate for prime minister, Maulana Fazlur Rahman, told newsmen that major thrust in “our dialogue with PML-Q was not on the prime minister’s candidate. We were more interested in settling the issue of constitutional amendments.”