Renaming of NWFP: ANP won't sign bill if demand not met

The meeting of Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Reforms scheduled for Wednesday would make or break as Awami National Party (ANP) has made it clear that it would not sign the draft of the 18th Amendment if its demand in relation to renaming of NWFP as Pukhtoonkhwa is not accepted. Talking to Business Recorder on Saturday.
ANP Senior Vice-President Senator Haji Adeel said that Constitutional Reforms Package without renaming the NWFP would be incomplete and that his party would not sign the draft. "We will neither sign the draft of Constitutional Reforms Package nor support it in the parliament without renaming the province," he said.
The ANP leader said his party would remain firm on its stance. He added that in this regard all the political parties, except for PML-N and PML-Q, are supportive to their stance. Haji Adeel said Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Reforms had completed its work with consensus on various issues of provincial autonomy. He said that if any party showed its disagreement on any issue, it reserved the right to write a note of dissent in this regard.
He said that if the PML-N disagreed to the new name, Pukhtoonkhwa, it could also write a note of dissent. Answering a question, the ANP leader said that, the issue of renaming of NWFP would be resolved amicably by the both parties before March 31. He said the constitutional package should be passed by the Parliament in full.
"It is not possible for us to accept it in parts," he added. Adeel said that now the PML-N was proposing "Afghania", a new name for NWFP, which had already been proposed by the ANP nine months ago, but the PML-N had rejected it. He said the ANP had also accepted "Pukhtoonkhwa-Abaseen" proposed by the PML-N but it made a U-turn and afterwards proposed "Pukhtoonkhwa-Khyber".
The ANP called a meeting of its think tank and once again accepted the name proposed by the PML-N, but when the PML(N) leader came out from their meeting they took a U-turn, he maintained. He said that not only the majority of people of NWFP supported Pukhtoonkhwa as the possible her name of the province, but also the majority of the political parties supported ANP's stance.