The JUI-F on Wednesday surrendered the slot of Senate opposition leader in favour of the PML-N on which Senate Chairman Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari notified Ishaq Dar as the opposition leader even before expiry of the seven-day deadline given to independent candidates to formally join either the treasury or opposition. Former Senate chairman Farooq H Naek on Monday asked independent senators to inform in-writing to the Senate Secretariat if they wanted to join the treasury or opposition so as to help ascertain support for the opposition leader candidate. According to the Senate Secretariat, Dar has support of 14 PML-N senators, 7 JUI-F and 2 independent members, one each from Punjab and Balochistan, making it 23 in favour of Dar.
There were 12 independent candidates in the House. Dar was re-elected unopposed on a technocrat seat from Punjab in the recently held Senate elections. Former Senate opposition leader Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri belonged to the JUI-F and was declared opposition leader against Ishaq by Naek due to which both the JUI-F and PML-N had started a tug of war.
