BAHAWALPUR, Feb 23: Former federal minister Syed Tasneem Nawaz Gardezi, who has recently announced his decision to join the PPP, is eying a PPP ticket for his son Belal Mustafa Gardezi.

Belal is expected to be fielded on a PPP ticket from the Punjab Assembly seat PP-273. This could be termed Tasneem’s attempt to directly help former district nazim and his old well-wisher, Tariq Cheema, who is currently campaigning for NA-186 against Riaz Hussain Peerzada of the PML-N.

Neither PPP nor Tasneem had yet announced the decision to join the party except some reports on private news channels. But Dawn learnt that gardezi could have been lured by his relatives, former prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and Punjab Governor Makhdoom Syed Ahmed Mehmood. Both of them might have assured him of accommodating his son Belal during allotment of party tickets.

Meanwhile, it is not yet confirmed whether Gardezi would be able to contest the upcoming general elections himself from NA-186 against his arch rival Peerzada (formerly of the PML-Q) owing to his illness. Gardezi had been seriously ill for a few months and recovered recently. During his illness, there had been reports he might contest the elections after his recovery.

In his absence, Cheema launched his campaign from Gardezi’s ancestral constituency where Peerzada was a strong candidate. Cheema’s close circles claimed he had received massive support from this constituency from where he had yet to announce his candidature formally. There were reports Cheema encouraged Gardezi to join the PPP along with his son Belal, whose support might prove beneficial for Cheema in contesting from this NA seat.

In fact, both Cheema and Belal from the PML-Q and PPP, respectively, are expected to join hands in their bid to defeat Peerzada and his nephew MPA from PP-273 Kazim Ali Peerzada, both from the PML-N.

In 2008, Peerzada had defeated Gardezi (independent) and Nawazish Ali Peerzada of the PPP. Now Nawazish was also an aspirant for the PPP ticket from this seat. He told Dawn he would apply for a PPP ticket and expressed hope of getting it. He argued the PPP had an alliance with the PML-Q in 2008 when the seat was won by Peerzada (then in PML-Q and now with the PML-N). In this situation, the PPP was not bound to agree on seat adjustment with Cheema as Peerzada was not with the PML-Q now.

He opined Cheema might go back to his original seat of NA-187 Bahawalpur-V from where Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi was defeated in 2008 by PML-N’s Saood Majid Chaudhry.

But Dawn learnt Cheema had invited Elahi to contest again from Bahawalpur district and the NA-187 seat could help Elahi regain PML-Q’s popularity in 2013. Although this had not been confirmed yet, there were strong indications regarding this, as Elahi was expected to address a large public meeting at Tailwala in Yazman tehsil on Feb 25 (tomorrow).

The PML-Q leaders had announced the meeting was aimed at displaying show of strength after the public meeting of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif in Head Rajkan in Dec last year. If the meeting proved successful, which is hoped for, the PML-Q leaders could be able to finally decide whether Elahi should be fielded from here or not.