ISLAMABAD, Dec 10: The government on Wednesday assured the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal that the consensus draft constitutional package prepared on the lines of the Lahore accord of September 6 will be presented in parliament in the next three to four days.

But this assurance was not without strings attached to it as the government said it wanted the religious parties’ alliance to give a commitment that it would give its vote of confidence to President Gen Pervez Musharraf before this package is brought to parliament.

This conditional assurance was given by ruling Pakistan Muslim League (Q) president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain to MMA’s secretary-general Maulana Fazalur Rehman during a half-an-hour meeting the two had at the latter’s parliament lodge suite here on Wednesday.

He asked the Maulana for a commitment on behalf of the MMA in respect of the trust vote prior to the presentation of the package in parliament.

He confirmed that the process of preparing a consensus draft amendment bill had already been started by senator S.M. Zafar and Sharifuddin Pirzada, and that MMA’s Liaqat Baloch and Hafiz Hussain Ahmed were assisting them.

Talking to newsmen at a luncheon hosted by party’s senator Dr Shehzad Wasim in honour of the visiting Sudanese National Congress party leader Kamal Obaid, Chaudhry Shujaat said he had asked Maulana Fazlur Rahman to provide assurance that MMA will give trust vote to Gen Musharraf.

He said he had also asked the Maulana not to insist on Dec 18 deadline which could provoke the government to delay the date of putting up the constitutional bill until Dec 19, as, according to him, no government would want to be seen to have succumbed to the pressure of deadlines.

Meanwhile, MMA’s secretary-general told reporters after the meeting that he had made it clear to the latter that the alliance will neither withdraw the deadline of Dec 18 nor will it give the trust vote to Gen Musharraf.

He said: “The constitutional package will have to be brought to parliament first and only then could we consider any other demand, including that of the trust vote.”

Without clearly ruling out the possibility of MMA giving the vote, Maulana Fazl said “first we want to see implementation of September 6 agreement” in the shape of a constitutional bill in which it was laid down that the article 63(1) (d) separating government office from public office will become operative on January 1, 2005.

He said he had told Mr Shujaat that the MMA could not trust a government which had handed over a KRL engineer to the FBI and which was blindly toeing the American dictates.

Earlier, talking to journalists at senator Waseem’s residence, Mr Shujaat said that he had warned the MMA leader that the matter of trust vote could not be kept pending till the passage of constitutional package otherwise the whole exercise of talks which resulted in the Lahore accord will become meaningless.

Responding to a question, he claimed that the ruling alliance had a share of 54 per cent in the electoral college and therefore the president could win the trust vote without the MMA. “But,” he added, “we wanted to give a message of goodwill to the opposition as Gen Musharraf had cooperated in all spheres including transfer of all powers to the elected government.”

Asked whether the separation of offices of the president and the COAS will be part of the written draft package, the PML leader said: “This issue has been settled and both sides have agreed on it”.

Replying to a question, he said the protest call was given by the MMA without any reason “as we all have entered in the final stage” of resolution of the constitutional crisis and working in continuation of the dialogue process which was started a year ago.

He confirmed a press report that Maulana Fazlur Rahman will be the leader of the opposition but this will not be part of the compromise deal.