IHT : Musharraf faces new roadblock in re-election bid

Musharraf faces new roadblock in re-election bid

By Carlotta Gall | August 16, 2007

ISLAMABAD: As President Pervez Musharraf began his campaign for re-election for another five-year term this week, senior figures of the ruling party that backs him are warning that the newly independent Supreme Court will almost certainly block his nomination for president and declare it unconstitutional.

New U.S. efforts to prod Musharraf into a power sharing arrangement with the exiled opposition leader, Benazir Bhutto, as a way for him to continue as president would run into the same difficulty, the politicians said.

The court has a new-found independence since Musharraf, a general who is also chief of staff of the army, tried to dismiss Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry this year, the politicians said. Chaudhry won reinstatement on July 20.

The chief justice has made clear in speeches his determination to uphold the Constitution and see an end to autocratic government, and he now represents the biggest obstacle to Musharraf's efforts to stay on.

"I think it is very difficult for him to get through the question of eligibility," Ishaq Khan Khakwani, the minister of state for information technology and telecommunication, said. "I would wish that he get through, but there are too many ifs and buts."

The unusually blunt comments from the general's own supporters, including a former prime minister and the vice president of the ruling party, the Pakistan Muslim League, are an indication of what they see as a strong shift in society against Musharraf's continued military rule.

Opposition parties have raised at least five objections against Musharraf's nomination as president, and since most of them touch on the Constitution, the objections will go to the Supreme Court for a decision, Khakwani said.

Among the thorniest of problems is the question whether Musharraf, 64, who seized power in a coup in 1999 and then was voted president by referendum in 2002, can be considered to have already served the maximum two consecutive terms in office.

Then there is the fact that he holds two official posts, as president and army chief of staff, which is not allowed in the Constitution. If he resigns his army post, then by law he should allow two years to lapse before running for elected office.

There is also a question of whether he can be chosen for a new five-year term by the outgoing National Assembly. That body will be dissolved immediately after the presidential election, which is conducted by an electoral college of the national and provincial Parliaments from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

In interviews, Khakwani and other politicians said Musharraf should resign from his post as army chief of staff if he is to overcome the opposition in the courts and in the streets. They will back him as a civilian candidate for president, they said, but as a military chief his position is increasingly untenable.

"Politically and morally I do not think he should be re-elected by the sitting assembly," Khakwani said. "If I were to offer an opinion to him, I would say: 'Sir, please take off your uniform, appoint a new chief of army staff and stand for election.' "

But so far the general has rejected that idea. He told party supporters Thursday that he would stand for re-election in uniform, according to Reuters.

At the same time, Musharraf, who narrowly backed away from imposing emergency rule last week after heavy media, political and diplomatic pressure, has said his plans to be re-elected are in accordance with the Constitution.

But more and more of his political supporters say the Supreme Court is unlikely to reconcile the general's ambitions with the law, even if he agrees to a power-sharing deal with Bhutto.

Such a deal envisages Bhutto's giving Musharraf parliamentary support in order to change the Constitution to allow him to continue in power, but if he does not give up his army post, the Supreme Court is likely to rule his election as unconstitutional anyway, they said.

"For the first time in my life, the Supreme Court as an institution is standing up," said Zafarullah Khan Jamali, who served as prime minister under Musharraf from 2002 to 2004. "The nomination of president from the present assembly will be challenged in court, and the government feeling is that the apex court, the Supreme Court, is not in favor."

Richard Boucher, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for South Asia, who is in Islamabad for two days of talks with the government, said Musharraf had given a commitment to making the transition from military rule to democracy and to addressing the issue of his army post during that transition in accordance with the Constitution. Boucher declined to say more.

The prospect of Musharraf's nomination being struck down means the party should prepare one or two reserve candidates to run for president, Khakwani said. He suggested Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, or the party president, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, as possible alternatives.

Political supporters of the president interviewed offered a range of alternatives for him.

"I would advise free and fair elections and that he behave like a fatherly figure," said Riaz Hussein Pirzada, an experienced lawmaker who joined the Pakistan Muslim League in 2002 because he knew and liked Musharraf. "If he has to transfer power, it should be done legally and in a calm manner. No one can stay forever, and he has done a lot for the country."

It is an irony that the man who Musharraf tried to dismiss five months ago will now decide on his right to stand for president, Khakwani said.

"It is his lordship the Chief Justice who decides whom the case will be heard by, how many people will hear it, and whether he will sit on the bench himself," he said.

The mood in the country, led by lawyer's associations and the political opposition, may overtake the power sharing deal between Musharraf and Bhutto and parliamentary proceedings, the politicians said.

"There will be a wider movement against the president," Syed Kabir Ali Wasti, vice president of the Pakistan Muslim League, predicted.

The lawyers' bar associations, which orchestrated a countrywide campaign in support of the suspended chief justice, would begin a new campaign against the president's election in uniform when they returned from summer break on Sept. 1, he said.

"I expect a successful movement," he said. "They are opinion writers and very important as far as public opinion is concerned."

Riaz Hussein Pirzada, an experienced lawmaker from southern Punjab, agreed. "The government is in a difficult position because of the lawyers," he said. "They are in a very tough mood. I think it will be a very difficult month for Pakistan."