Ashfaq group delegation to meet Fehmida today

KARACHI: An important meeting of the Ashfaq group and IPC minister Dr Fehmida Mirza will be held at Islamabad on Tuesday (today) to discuss the pressing matters of football which has created a huge impediment in the way of the electoral process of the Pakistan Football Federation (PFF).

A six-member delegation will meet Fehmida at her office in the afternoon, it was reliably learnt on Monday. Sources said that the Ashfaq group would stick to its stance that it would not vacate the PFF headquarters and would only allow NC to occupy a portion of the PFF secretariat and start working towards fair and transparent elections.

It is also expected that the Ashfaq group will tell the minister that they cannot trust the existing NC and will only cooperate if a new and neutral NC is brought in by FIFA. The Ashfaq group has constituted a five-member committee comprising Amir Dogar, Ashfaq Hussain Shah, Fateh Mohammad Baloch, Saeed Tikko and Chaudhry Salim to meet with the NC and government officials to discuss the matter and reach a conclusion.

Sources said that the Ashfaq group would insist that NC should be changed. However, sources said that some members of the delegation might press the Ashfaq group that they should vacate the PFF House as it was the only way to take a step forward towards elections and get the sanctions imposed by FIFA on Pakistan lifted.

Sources said that the five-member committee would also be joined by Sharafat Bukhari, a former secretary of Islamabad Football Association (IFA) and current active member of the Ashfaq group.

FIFA suspended Pakistan in the first week of April after the Ashfaq group overlooked the deadline set by FIFA for them to vacate the PFF headquarters which they had occupied in the final days of March.