ISLAMABAD: An eight-member parliamentary committee will continue its deliberations on the third consecutive day on Friday in Islamabad to reach consensus on the name for caretaker Prime Minister, Dispatch News Desk (DND) reported.
Today is the last day for the committee to nominate a consensus candidate, if it fails the matter will automatically go to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), which will have to finalise one name within two days.
The parliamentary committee having equal representation from the treasury and opposition benches on Thursday met for the second day but could not evolve consensus over a nominee out of four names for the coveted post.
The chief of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) says the decision would ultimately be taken by the Election Committee, expressing the hope the caretaker prime minister would be Justice (retd) Nasir Aslam Zahid, a nominee of the PML-N.
Both the sides have objected to the nominees submitted by them with the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) expressing reservations on Nasir Aslam Zahid and the PML-N criticizing Dr Ishrat Hussain.
The PPP says Nasir Aslm Zahid was close to the Shairf family while allegation of murder of his brother-in-law was leveled on its co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari.
While the PML-N says one of Dr Ishrat Hussain’s relatives Khalil was a close friend of President Asif Ali Zardari.
However, after the meeting on Thursday, members of the parliamentary committee, formed under article 224-A of the Constitution, expressed the confidence that the matter would be resolved with consensus by the Committee.
Syed Khurshid Shah‚ while talking to media‚ said the committee had moved forward on the issue after detailed discussions on merits and demerits of all four names.
Shah vowed that all possible efforts would be made for the matter to be resolved in the meeting.
Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain said it would be quite unfortunate if the matter was not resolved by the committee. He said politicians should resolve political matters by themselves rather than it being resolved through non-political people.
Senator Pervez Rashid said they were close to finalizing the name of the Caretaker Prime Minister. He dispelled the impression that there was any deadlock in talks on the matter.
DND
