Zardari picks young Saifullah ignoring heavyweights from Capital

President Asif Ali Zardari has selected a new young candidate for upcoming Senate elections from the federal capital ignoring stalwarts.
“Usman Saifullah Khan, son of Anwar Saifullah Khan, member provincial assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from Lakki Marwat is being preferred over heavy candidate of Pakistan Peoples Party from Islamabad,” well-placed sources told ‘Online’ here on Sunday.
Sources further said that Mr Saifullah was being preferred over strong candidates including Mustafa Khokhar, Qazi Sultan Mehmood, Raja Mansoor and others from the same constituency.
Sources said that strong candidates from Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) who would likely to contest the elections included Chuadhry Aitzaz Ahsan, Babar Awan, Raza Rabbani, Saeed Ghani, Amir Dhamra and from Sindh. Dr Karim Khawaja on technocrat and Sehar Kamran and Shahida Rehmani on women seats while Hari Ram on minority seat. Amina Taseer or Khalida Moshin from Punjab. Mustafa Khokhar, Qazi Sultan Mehmood and Raja Mansoor. Mirza Ikhtiar Baig, Khwaja Nasimul Ghani, Salim Mandviwala, Rukhsana Zuberi, Qaiser Bangali, Quratul Ain Marri, Waqar Mehdi, Pardeep Kumar from the ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Sharmila Farooqui, Makhdoom Raqfiq-u-Zaman, brother of Federal Minister for Commerce Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Qazi Asad Abid, sitting MNA Mahesh Malani, MPA Humera Alwni, Pervaiz Ansari, Former District Nazim Khurshid Junejo, Salim Mandviwala and other heavyweights. Raza Rabbani, Mukhtiar Ahmed (Aajiz) Dhamrah, Saeed Ghani, Mohammad Panah Odho, Hari Ram Kishori Lal while Ghulam Akbar Lasi, a former federal minister, had resigned from the PPP basic membership after the party refused to grant him a ticket for the upcoming Senate elections.
“Similarly, six candidates who had been granted party tickets by the coalition partner in the federal cabinet and ruling party in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Awami National Party (ANP) included Baz Muhammad Khan, Shahi Syed, Azam Khan Hoti, Ilyas Bilour, Amarjeet Singh Malhotra, Zahida Khan while the seventh ticket was to be allocated after consultation with coalition partners” said a source closed to ANP leadership.
Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam- F (JUI-F) is about to field Kamran Murtaza, Sabina Rauf, Hafiz Muhammad Assad, Ayaz Khan Mandokhel, Hafiz Hussain Ahmad, Hafiz Hamdullah, Mufti Abdul Sattar & Munzoor Mengal from Balochistan while Talah Mehmood, Rahat Hussan & Farhana Khalid Baloch as candidates from KP.
At the same time some other heavyweights from Balochistan for the upcoming Senate elections included Barrister Saifullah Khan Magsi, Sardar Fateh Muhammad Hussni, Hina Gulzar and Munawara Munir, Isaraullah Zehri, and others.
While parliamentarians from Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA) are making efforts to bring relatives of three sitting MNAs in the Senate unopposed. They are pressing parliamentary leader of FATA MPs in the National Assembly Munir Khan Aurakzai to contest for the Senate elections while other three names of candidates are Anwarul Hussain brother of Jawad Hussain, Bismillah Khan brother or father of Engineer Shaukatullah and Abdul Malik Qadri brother of Noorul Haque Qadri MNA.
Proposed candidates of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the second largest party in the National Assembly are Ishaq Dar, Sardar Zulfiqar Khosa, Begum Nuzhat Amir Sadiq, Rafique Rijwana and Zafar Dhandla.
At the outset of Senate elections PML-Q splinter group ‘Likeminded’ is also striving for entering into an alliance and finalize seat adjustment with PML-N and in this pretext Humayun Akhtar Khan and Haroon Akhtar Khan had also held a meeting with Nawaz Sharif.
According to PML-N sources, both parties are working on a draft which promises 30 National Assembly seats and one Senate slot to the Likeminded who had originally demanded 37 seats
However, Co-ordination Committee of Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) had almost short-listed candidature for coming Senate elections and would announcement of candidates was likely in next few days. Shahida Jamil and few other names are in the air as MQM candidates.
So far as candidates from former ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML-Q) are concerned sources revealed that PML-Q was lobbying in favour of Nighat Agha, Mushahid Hussain Sayed. Kamil Ali Agha, Naser Mengal, Khalid Ranjha and.Aleem Adil Sheikh few others.
Senators retiring on March 11 include Tariq Azim Khan and Wasim Sajjad from the federal capital while Mohammad Ishaq Dar, Zaheer-ud-din Babar Awan, Jamal Khan Leghari, Syed Javed Ali Shah, Lt. Gen. (R) Javed Ashraf,. Mohammad Ali Durrani, Naeem Hussain Chattha, Gulshan Saeed, Nilofar Bakhtiar, S. M. Zafar and Haroon Khan from Punjab province.
Similarly, from Sindh Province Mian Raza Rabbani, Ahmed Ali, Abdul Ghaffar Qureshi, Syed Sajid Hussain Zaidi, Safdar Ali, Syed Tahir Hussain Mashhadi,Dr. Khalid Mehmood Soomro, Ms. Ratna, Semeen Siddiqui, Abdul Hafeez Shaikh and Abdul Khaliq Pirzada.
From the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Sentors including Ammar Ahmed Khan, Saleem Saifullah Khan, Moulana Gul Naseeb Khan, Muhammad Ghufran Khan, Muhammad Talha Mahmood, Prof. Khurshid Ahmed, Prof. Muhammad Ibrahim Khan, Fauzia Fakhar-uz-Zaman, Afia Zia, Ilyas Ahmed Bilour, Qari Muhammad Abdullah and from FATA Hafiz Rashid Ahmad, Abdul Raziq, Abdur Rashid, and Maulana Muhammad Saleh Shah are to be retired next month.
Senators including Shahid Hassan Bugti, Muhammad Ismail, Israrullah Khan, Mohabat Khan Marri, Abdur Rahim Khan Mandokhail, Dr. Abdul Malik, Jan Muhammad Jamali, Rehana Yahya Baloch, Sabina Rauf, Saeed Ahmed Hashmi and Rahmatullah Kakar are going to retire next month.
As per announcement by Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) polling for Senate elections will be held on March 2, 2012, elections will be held on 54 Senate seats. Candidates can file nomination papers on February 13 & 14, 2012. Scrutiny of nomination papers will be on February 16 & 17.