Karachi, July 29 (IANS) Syed Murad Ali Shah, of the Pakistan Peoples Party, was on Friday elected as the new Sindh Chief Minister, replacing the elderly Syed Qaim Ali Shah, who was midway through his third term but had resigned earlier this week on the party's directive.
Murad Ali Shah, who was currently provincial Finance Minister and is the son of former Chief Minister Abdullah Shah (1993-96), secured 88 votes against three in the favour of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's Khurram Sher Zaman, in the election in the assembly, Dawn online reported.
This is the first time that the son of a former Sindh Chief minister has been elected as the chief of the provincial government in the PPP's traditional bastion.
The Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), which did not field its candidate, did not participate in the voting process too.
Governor Ishratul Ebad Khan will administer the oath of office to Murad Ali Shah as the 27th Sindh Chief Minister.
The PPP nominated provincial Finance Minister Murad Ali Shah for the post after the resignation of Qaim Ali Shah earlier this week.
A former adviser to the chief minister, Murad Ali Shah was disqualified from the 2013 general election as he held Canadian citizenship at the time. He renounced his Canadian citizenship to contest by-polls in 2014.
The decision to replace Qaim Ali Shah as the chief minister was taken at a PPP meeting in Dubai.
Qaim Ali Shah, 83, was increasingly seen as ineffective, slow and prone to making gaffes publicly. He was much satirised on TV shows as "Shahji" who is sleeping most of the time, even when people are talking to him.
The veteran PPP leader had as served a Federal Minister in the Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto government in the 1970s, and first become Sindh Chief Minister in 1988 when the PPP came to power in Islamabad and Sindh under Benazir Bhutto. However, his government was dismissed in 1990 along with that of Benazir Bhutto. He became chief minister for the second time in 2008 when the PPP swept back to power in the general and provincial elections held in the aftermath of Benzir Bhutto's assassination. He had led the party to victory in 2013, and became chief minister again.
