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Polls: Benazir serves ultimatum on Musharraf

ISLAMABAD: Yet reluctant to shut the door on President Pervez Musharraf completely, Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party said on Thursday if an understanding cannot be reached with him in the week left before the filing of nomination papers for the October 6 presidential election, it would “consider” joining other Opposition parties to resign from the National Assembly and the provincial Assembly to protest his contesting while remaining the army chief.

The All Parties Democracy Movement, comprising all other Opposition parties including the Nawaz Sharif-led Pakistan Muslim League (N), which took a decision to quit the Assemblies if Gen. Musharraf went ahead with his declared plan to seek another term, said it would carry out the threat on the day he files his nomination papers.

If the PPP implements its threat, the en masse resignation by the Opposition parties from the electoral college will rob the presidential election of its legitimacy and credibility.

The election’s legal validity may also come under challenge as the North-West Frontier Province is controlled by the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, a partner in the APDM. Its resignation would mean that the NWFP provincial Assembly will stand dissolved, rendering the electoral college incomplete. Similarly, an MMA pull-out from the ruling coalition in Baluchistan, may lead to a second dissolution.

PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar said the party had hoped to reach an understanding with Gen. Musharraf for a constitutional package, but it had not yet materialised.

The PPP has talked about a constitutional package that would enable the President to contest the election immediately after quitting as Army chief without waiting the mandatory two years, and that would also include removing the bar on two-time Prime Ministers holding the office for a third time and doing away the President’s powers to dissolve Parliament.

The News reported that the two sides are to resume negotiations in Dubai on Thursday but Mr. Babar said he was unaware if any meetings were scheduled.

“As of now there is progress on the deal and no agreement has been reached,” he said.

Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid conceded that if the PPP resigns, then Gen. Musharraf’s re-election would suffer from a lack of credibility, but in that case, he may exercise the option to impose emergency or martial law.

He said if an agreement is worked out with Ms. Bhutto, the PPP would abstain from voting which would not affect the election.

The PML (N) welcomed the shift in the PPP stand. “The entire Opposition is one on this. The PPP too has stated the same. We expect a united stand on the plans to resign,” said party chairman Raja Zafarul Haq.

Jamat-i-Islami leader Qazi Hussain Ahmed said all parties in the APDM were “bound” by their decision to resign.

“Is there any example in the world where the chief of army staff is elected President?” he asked.

But it is far from clear yet if the other constituent of the MMA, Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam, which is in the driving seat in the NWFP and

Baluchistan, will actually carry out the resignation threat.

The Maulana himself is in Saudi Arabia on a pilgrimage.

The legal community came out strongly against the announcement of the elections. Supreme Council Bar Association president Munir Malik said lawyers would protest “vociferously” on the day of the scrutiny of nominations.

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