950819

President, PM

review law,

order, other

irritants

SIKANDER HAYAT

ISLAMABAD: President Farooq Leghari and Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto met on Saturday and reportedly held incisive consultations on the eve of a wider meeting summoned by the president for Sunday to discuss the deteriorating law and order situation throughout the country.

Karachi, with special reference to the tentative Government-MQM (Altaf) talks next week; war-like situation in the tribal area; and relentless monsoon rains flooding many areas came under sharp focus at the meeting between the president and the prime minister at the Aiwan-i-Sadr, it was further learnt.

Prime minister also reportedly updated the president on the foreign response to her appeal for flood victims, and some relief measures taken by the federal and provincial governments in the flood-affected areas.

The prime minister is believed to have also briefed Leghari on current turmoil in the Sui gasfield area, an issue that is the main agenda for the Senate session which has been requisitioned by the senators from Balochistan. The Senate will meet from Sunday, while the National Assembly is already in session.

According to an authentic source, the president briefed the prime minister on his recent meeting with the ANP leader Ajmal Khattak, underlining the imperative of bringing down the political temperature which has literally brought to halt the legislative process to the utter discredit of the elected institutions and democratic process in the country.

At the Sunday meeting chief ministers of Sindh, NWFP and Balochistan, Senior Minister Punjab Makhdoom Altaf (in case of Chief Minister Wattoo's absence) and a number of federal ministers are expected to be present. Federal Miniser for Water and Power Ghulam Mustafa Khar will also attend the meeting at the Aiwan-e-Sadr because "distribution of water" in the context of the newly reconstituted National Finance Commission is also on the agenda of the meeting.

Of late the president has exhibited signs of "acting as a bridge" between the government and the opposition. Last week at the Media Foundation function he conveyed in almost unmistakable terms his belief that as a president he has certain obligations under the constitution, and that he would do "his bit" in trying to remove the irritants between the two major warring political power centres.

Not surprisingly, his promise to play his due constitutional role came on the day he had met with Ajmal Khattak. That meeting had taken place at the president's desire and Khattak was given an attentive one-to-one hearing on a number of issues that confront the nation today. The president is said to have not differed much from what Ajmal Khattak had to say on the role of the ruling elite including the prime minister and Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar in the precipitation of political crisis, particularly in Karachi.

It may be of interest to recall that in the wake of Ajmal Khattak's meeting with Farooq Leghari the Leader of Opposition Nawaz Sharif gave up the idea of speaking on the floor of the National Assembly, though he had come fully prepared with a speech, some of his partymen had described that evening as a "bombshell".