The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) has finally decided to join the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)-led coalition government at the Centre in a bid to pull the “country out of the quagmire,” party’s deputy convener Mustafa Kamal revealed on Sunday.
As the February 8 general election resulted in no political party securing enough seats to form a majority government at the Centre, key political players have been holding negotiations to chalk out a power-sharing formula for the new coalition government.
In a breakthrough last week, the PML-N and the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) announced striking a power-sharing deal to form a coalition government. Under the deal, PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif will be elected as the country’s prime minister while PPP Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari retain the slot of president for the next five years.
Speaking to a private TV channel, Kamal said the ideal situation is not to become part of the coalition government to be led by PML-N’s Shehbaz.
However, the former Karachi mayor said the decision to join the government had been taken to steer the country out of the crisis. “The negotiation with the PML-N is underway in the right direction,” he said, adding that the MQM-P wanted to take responsibility for serving their electorate.
He also rejected the reports of deadlock with the PML-N during negotiations on a power-sharing formula at the Centre. Kamal also said that in the first phase, newly-elected lawmakers would take oath and the decision regarding ministries would be taken in a second phase.
“I will not confirm about [how many ministries] we are demanding,” he said. “We have decided that [MQM-P] will become a part of the government and will also take the ministries.” Kamal said the MQM-P would present its draft for constitutional amendment and they wanted the PML-N to support it. “We have accepted a challenge to become part of the government.”