ISLAMABAD - Leader of Opposition Syed Khursheed Shah on Thursday made consultation with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for picking some mutually acceptable person to fill the slot of Chief Election Commissioner of Pakistan.
The slot of Chief Election Commissioner is vacant since the resignation of Fakhruddin G. Ibrahim in August 2013.
According to official sources, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has floated the names of Justice(Retd) Saeeduz Zaman Siddiqui, Justice(Retd) Rana Baghwan Das and Justice(Retd) Tasadiq Hussain JIllani while the Leader of Opposition Syed Khursheed Shah came up with the names of Justice(Retd) Tariq Aziz and Justice Ajmal Mian.
Sources aware of the developments taking place on this front informed that Leader of Opposition has raised objection over the candidature of Justice (Retd) Saeeduz Zaman Siddiqui, who was PML-N candidate for the slot of President in 2008 and was defeated by the PPP Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari.
On the other hand, Justice (Retd) Rana Baghwandas had already said that he would not accept the slot and therefore could not be considered to be a potential candidate.
In a brief media chat after the meeting with Prime Minister Syed Khursheed Shah said that he would soon be consulting other opposition parties in the Parliament to take their input on the matter and expressed his optimism that the decision would be made in a next couple of days.
The opposition leader would also be meeting with the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi and Qaumi Watan Party (QWP) chief Aftab Sherpao to discuss the appointment.
The Supreme Court of Pakistan had directed the government to fill the slot by Nov. 13 otherwise the apex court would withdraw the judge of the Supreme Court of Pakistan performing the duties as acting Chief Election Commissioner.