While Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz had to hand over the seat of Senate chairman to the Pakistan Peoples Party, it managed to reward an old party loyalist with the post of Syedal Khan Nasir.

Nasir is relativley lesser known on the national politicial scene but has been associated with the party since the early 1990s.

He joined the party’s student wing, Muslim Student Federation’s Quetta chapter, in 1996 and remained there till 2002 first as central general secretary and then as provincial president.

During his time in MSF, he was known to be an active member of Saad Rafique’s group.

He officially joined the PMLN in 2002 and served in various roles at the provincial level, eventaully rising to become general secretary of the party’s provincial chapter. He has also been part of PMLN’s central working committee in Balochistan for almost 20 years.

During Sanaullah Zehri’s government in Balochistan, Nasir worked as a special assistant to the chief minister.

Party circles say that Nasir is part of the party’s cadres that believe in politics of ‘resistance’. He is also known to be one of the few PMLN leaders who staged protests after the coup in 1999.