Muttahida Qaumi Movement's leader Farooq Sattar. Photo: Geo News file

ISLAMABAD: MQM-P's leader Farooq Sattar has summoned the party's Sindh Assembly members to his PIB office later today for consultations over the upcoming Senate elections.

In a meeting, concluded in the wee hours of Friday, Sattar instructed the party's National Assembly members to remain in Islamabad to cast their votes in the Senate elections scheduled to be held on March 3. 

Sattar had earlier challenged the Election Commission of Pakistan's (ECP) jurisdiction to hear a petition pertaining to the party's convenership on March 1. 

The infighting between party members over nominations for the upcoming Senate elections had earlier resulted in the emergence of splinter groups - Dr Farooq Sattar led PIB Colony faction and the Bahadurabad group consisting of Amir Khan, Nasreen Jalil, Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui and others.

Farooq Sattar challenges ECP's jurisdiction in party convenership petition

'Workers decided party's fate in intra-party elections'

The petition, filed by Sattar's legal counsel Babar Sattar states that the party's internal matters cannot be heard by the ECP, demanding the Bahadurabad group's petition over should be dismissed

"MQM-P belongs to the party's workers and only they will protect it," he had told journalists outside the ECP premises. "They [party workers] announced their verdict in the intra-party elections."

Sattar had also said that he chose the constitutional process of holding intra-party elections and getting the mandate from the party.

"I have proposed a formula if we want to sit down and solve matters through negotiation but it was Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui who approached the ECP to challenge [my] constitutional position," he had said.