ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif has sent a summary to President Dr Arif Alvi to appoint Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) leader Nasreen Jalil as governor Sindh, it is learnt.
According to the sources, Jalil will take oath as the governor of Sindh after the proposal gets approved by the president.
Jalil would be the third female governor in the history of Pakistan after Dr Shama Khalid who served as the governor of Gilgit-Baltistan from March-September 2010, and Begum Raana Liaquat Ali Khan who was the Sindh governor from 1973-1976.
The sources said that the MQM-P had suggested five names, Amir Khan, Amir Chishti, Waseem Akhtar, Kishwar Zehra, and Nasreen Jalil, and sent them to Prime Minister Shehbaz for the post of governor Sindh. Jalil, a dynamic activist, has already served as the Deputy Convener of the MQM-P.
Jalil was born in Lahore and her father, Zafar-ul-Ahsan was the deputy commissioner of Lahore at the time of the British Indian Empire in 1947, and later he worked as an Indian Civil Service (ICS) officer.
Jalil has served as a Senator from March 2012 to March 2018. She was elected to the Senate of Pakistan in March 1994 for a six-year term. She was member of the Senate Standing Committees on Commerce and on Foreign Affairs, Kashmir Affairs and Northern Affairs and on Health, Social Welfare and special Education and also Chairperson on Functional Committee on Human Rights. Though Jalil was born in Lahore but she spent most of her time in Karachi. In her childhood, she had been living in London. She went to Paris for her education. Besides Urdu, she is fluent in English and French.
She joined MQM and started her political career from Karachi. During the Karachi operation, she was arrested and handed down a three-year jail term. After spending six months in jail, she had been placed under house arrest.
The office of the Sindh governor fell vacant on April 12 as Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Imran Ismail tendered his resignation, hours before Prime Minister Shehbaz took oath as the 23rd premier of Pakistan.
Speaker of Sindh Assembly Agha Siraj Durrani had been directed to perform the functions of the governor of Sindh till the appointment of a new incumbent for the post.
MQM-P was a key ally of the alliance led by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and switching sides to the opposition parties led to the fall of the Imran Khan government.
The leaderships of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had vowed that the promises made to the MQM-P leaders will be fulfilled. They also urged coordinated efforts between the Centre and the province for the development of Sindh.
The federal government on Saturday also nominated Baligh-ur-Rehman as the new governor of Punjab and a summary to replace the incumbent Governor Omar Sarfaraz Cheema was sent to President Alvi.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Baligh-ur-Rehman belongs to District Bahawalpur. He was elected from the NA-185 constituency in 2008 and 2013 and served as the state minister for Education, Interior and Narcotics Control when Nawaz Sharif became the prime minister after the PML-N’s victory in the 2013 elections. After the removal of Nawaz Sharif, former Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi included him in his cabinet and made him the federal minister for Education and Professional Training.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022