Senate deputy chairman denies having differences with chairman

ISLAMABAD: Senate Deputy Chairman Senator Saleem Mandviwalla on Friday denied having differences with Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani but said that difference of opinion on different issues was quite natural.

“I can have difference of opinion with even those senators, who visit me in my office,” he said while addressing a news conference here. About some reports of bringing no-trust motion against Sanjrani, he said that it was up to political parties to decide.

Regarding recent meetings of various political leaders including Maulana Fazlur Rehman with PPP Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari, Mandviwalla said it was part of a political process, which keeps going on.

Mandiviwalla refuted the defamation notice of former ambassador Ali Jahangir Siddiqui, terming it an attempt to target parliamentarians to stay quiet and not tell the truth about the reality of their dealing.

Speaking here at a news conference, Senator Mandviwalla said that a defamation case was filed in 2017 against him by a company namely SPM (Pvt) Ltd. and their authorised officer is Muhammad Amir Shafiq s/o Shafiqullah. “The case is based on my tweet in 2017 in which I mentioned appointment of Ali Siddiqui son of Jahangir Siddiqui as Adviser to PM after their investment of $20 million in Air Blue,” he claimed.

Such attempts, he said, could not pressurise him or his party and he refused to surrender and stand by his earlier statement. “I am a Jiala and will face the court proceedings,” he remarked.