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MMA leaders split over issue of resignations

* Three parties including JUI-F refuse to resign

By Mohammad Imran

ISLAMABAD: The six-party Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) has split down the middle over the issue of resignations, with three of its components refusing to quit the National Assembly in protest at the Women’s Protection Bill.

The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (Fazl), JUI (Senior) led by Pir Abdur Rahim Naqshbandi, and Jamiat Ahle Hadith led by Professor Sajid Mir said at an MMA parliamentary party meeting on Wednesday that they would not resign from the National Assembly.

Qazi Hussain Ahmed, MMA president and chief of the Jamaat-e-Islami, is the biggest proponent of resignations. He said at the meeting that the MMA should resign because that was what the Supreme Council had decided. He said it was right to resign because parliament had just passed an “un-Islamic” bill.

However, other MMA leaders disagreed. “The decision to resign from the assembly was not taken unanimously. It was a decision which was imposed by the alliance president (Qazi) on all of us,” the sources quoted Mir as saying. “We should not leave the parliament open for PPPP by resigning,” he added.

Mir accused Qazi of imposing a decision of the JI central executive committee on all MMA parties. “We are not bound to obey the JI CEC. We have our own CECs and their decisions must also be taken into account,” he was quoted as saying.

Maulana Fazalur Rehman said resigning would harm the religious parties’ causes. “The government wants to keep us away from parliament to pave the way for changing more Islamic laws including the blasphemy laws and laws related to the finality of the Holy Prophet (pbuh),” he said.

He said if the alliance vacated its seats it could not contest by-elections to those seats, nor stop the polls. He said he was bound by the decision of the JUI-F CEC, and that had decided not to resign.

Qari Gul Rehman, JUI-S secretary general, noted that when Gen Ayub Khan introduced family laws, Maulana Ghulam Hazarvi and Mufti Mehmood had not resigned from the assembly.

The sources said that the members opposed to resigning had proposed the formation of a committee to negotiate with other opposition parties, including Nawaz Sharif in London, to adopt a joint strategy on resignations.

Qari also proposed that the MMA continue to boycott NA proceedings and parliamentarians stop drawing salaries.

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