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PPP, PML(N) to form government

— Photo: AFP

Pact sealed: Pakistan People’s Party co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and Pakistan Muslim League (N) leader Nawaz Sharif greet each others at a joint press conference in Murree, near Islamabad, on Sunday. The leaders signed a formal declaration on forming a coalition government. At centre is senior PPP leader Sherry Rehman.

ISLAMABAD: In an act of unprecedented statesmanship, Pakistan’s two main democratic parties on Sunday resolved the differences dogging their power sharing talks to announce they would form a historic coalition government and demanded that President Pervez Musharraf convene the new National Assembly without delay.

The Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) will join the Pakistan People’s Party-led government at the Centre, while the PPP will join a PML(N)-led government in Punjab.

The two parties have agreed that the superior judges sacked in the November 3, 2007 emergency imposed by the retired General Musharraf will be restored within a month of government formation, through a resolution of Parliament.

The agreement came exactly a year after General Musharraf’s first attempt to remove the then Chief Justice, Iftikhar Chaudhary, on March 9 last year.

“We feel we are standing on the verge of making history,” said PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari at a joint press conference with PML (N) leader Nawaz Sharif at Bhurban in Murree, where the two met this afternoon.

Mr. Sharif said that by giving substantial victories to both parties, the people of Pakistan had mandated that they should join hands and work together.

“Musharraf saab says it is a hung verdict and no party has won. It may be a hung verdict, but it is against him, and it is against dictatorial rule. He must accept this reality, accept the people’s verdict and he must not create any obstacles in the path of government formation,” said Mr. Sharif.

A joint “summit declaration” signed by the two leaders before a massive media assembly said “the coalition partners are ready to form the governments and the National and Provincial Assemblies should be convened immediately”.

The PPP is expected to announce its prime ministerial candidate in the next couple of days. Significantly, the joint declaration also states that that the prime ministerial nominee of the PPP will be “fully supported” by all coalition partners, and that “it was suggested by PML(N) that the Prime Minister’s candidate should be one who can deliver on the joint agenda of the coalition.”

This appears to indicate that PPP deputy leader Makhdoom Amin Fahim may not be in the running, and that the party may settle for a candidate from Punjab. In a sign of a rift in the making between him and the PPP leader, Mr. Fahim told television channels that he was not invited to the Bhurban meeting.

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