Slain Bhutto’s party to lead new coalition government in Pakistan

Pakistan People's Party (PPP) of slain Benazir Bhutto and Pakistan Muslim
League (PML-N) of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif may form coalition
government in Islamabad after emerging as two top winners respectively in
the parliamentary elections generally being viewed as transparent.

In the elections, which were scheduled to be held on January 8 but were
delayed till February 18 after Bhutto's assassination on December 27 last
year, the PPP and PML-N inflicted a crushing defeat on the pro-Musharraf
Pakistan Muslim League-Q or PML-Q.

Bhutto's party, now led by her widower Asif Zardari, bagged 87 seats, as the
results of election in 258 out of 268 contested National Assembly
constituencies were declared. The PML-N of Sharif was trailing the PPP with
66 seats, PML-Q with 38, Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) with 19, Awami
National Party (ANP) with 10, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) with three,
PML-Functional with four, Balochistan National Party (BNP) and PPP-Sherpao
with one each and National People's Party with two while 27 seats went to
independent candidates.

The National Assembly, the lower house of Pakistan's bicameral Parliament,
has 342 seats. However, 272 members are elected through direct election
while 60 seats are reserved for women and 10 for non-Muslims. The reserved
seats are filled according to priority lists provided by the contesting
parties and in proportion with the votes obtained by each party.

Besides 23 former federal ministers, incumbent National Assembly Speaker
Ameer Hussain and PML-Q President Shujaat Hussain are among the political
stalwarts who could not win elections. Majority of the losers belongs to the
PML-Q that ruled the country for the past five years and elected General
Pervez Musharraf in military uniform as president of the country for second
term just weeks before culmination of its ruling tenure.

The PPP and PML-N, which cashed on the anti-Musharraf sentiments in the
general elections, are perfectly placed to form governments at the centre
and in two important provinces. The PPP has won majority seats in the
provincial assembly of Sindh, the home province of slain Bhutto, while the
PML-N has emerged as the largest party in the Punjab Assembly.

The PML-Q secured 66 seats in Punjab, nine in Sindh, 17 in Balochistan and
six in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) assemblies to become the only
party after the PPP which bagged seats in all the provincial assemblies. In
an excellent performance, the PPP won 78 seats in Punjab, 65 in Sindh, seven
in Balochistan and 17 in the NWFP assemblies.

The PML-N, which emerged as the largest party in the Punjab -- the home
province of Sharif, won 101 seats in the province with five in the NWFP
whereas it did not bag any seat in Sindh and Balochistan assemblies.

The Pakhtun nationalist ANP emerged as the largest party in the NWFP
Assembly with 31 seats whereas it won one seat in the Balochistan Assembly
and two in the Sindh Assembly, having no seat in the Punjab.

The MQM, which was in the past confined to Karachi, fielded its candidates
in the Punjab and NWFP also but failed to win any seat in assemblies of
three provinces other than Sindh, where it won 38 provincial assembly seats.

A good number of independent candidates have won seats of the provincial
assemblies with 35 making their way to the Punjab, one to Sindh, 10 to
Balochistan and 18 to NWFP assemblies.

Interestingly, the MMA -- a coalition of six religio-political parties which
ruled the NWFP for five years with being the ruling coalition partner in
Balochistan -- could win just nine seats in the NWFP, six in Balochistan and
two in the Punjab assemblies, failing to win even a single seat in the Sindh
Assembly.

This shows that people have rejected the religious parties, allaying
concerns of the international community that religious extremists can reach
power corridors and have success to the nuclear weapons of Pakistan. Hence,
the elections held amid an extremely volatile situation because of rampant
suicide bombings almost in all parts of the country should dispel the
rhetoric about influence of religious zealots in the Pakistani society.

Formation of governments

PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif and his aides are meeting PPP Co-Chairman Asif
Zardari in Islamabad today (Wednesday), as major political parties have
started intense lobbying and contacts. "I think the meeting between the two
will take place today and we will never disappoint the nation," PPP central
leader Rehman Malik said when contacted. "The riddle, if any, will be
resolved through talks."

The MQM leaders have said they are ready to talk to any party in the
interest of the country while the ANP has also said that it will decide in a
couple of days on formation of government in the troubled NWFP.

Zardari has expressed his resolve to form the consensus government with the
PML-N, ANP and all other democratic forces. "We will form a government of
national consensus which takes along every democratic force and I am going
to meet Nawaz Sharif in a day or two to discuss the formation of the
government," he told a press conference after chairing a crucial party
meeting on Tuesday.

However, he did not disclose the party nominee for the slot of the prime
minister that was to be discussed in the party meeting and said it would be
decided later. He said the PPP did not want anyway to sit with those who
were part and parcel of the previous regime.

Although he accused the interim government of rigging elections in selective
constituencies, at the same time Zardari said: "This is a sombre moment for
us that we have won the elections and we accepted the results. We have lost
our leader Benazir Bhutto and now we will fulfil her agenda. We are thankful
to Mian Nawaz Sharif who accepted the advice of Benazir Bhutto to
participate in the elections and did not leave the field for those who were
ruling the country for last eight years."

Zardari said the PPP would form the government with help of its allies for
the collective good of the nation taking the four conditions into account.
"We promised the people to change the system and will move in this direction
after forming consensus government," he said.

About the four conditions, Zardari said the party first of all would remove
the law that was being used as a tool against the media and provide a full
freedom to media. "We want to give complete provincial autonomy. We want to
make the judiciary strong and lastly we have a commitment to have a strong
Parliament."

About the party view on restoration of the deposed judges, Zardari avoided
the pointed questions, saying the Parliament would take all decisions in
this regard. "We want powerful judiciary and the Parliament will discuss all
these issues."

The Bhutto widower said after forming the government, the PPP would seek a
United Nations investigation into the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. "With
whomsoever we form the government we will take a decision with them to go to
the UN for the probe. We are not fighting a war against terrorism for anyone
else but for our own country and even that we have lost our leader in line
against terrorism. We will hold dialogue with all those who are sitting in
the mountains for peace and progress."

Trounced party chief concedes defeat

PML-Q President Shujaat Hussain has said that his party accepted the
election results with an open heart. Addressing a press conference in his
hometown of Gujrat on Tuesday, he said his party had presented its
performance before the people and was ready to accept their opinion. "The
PML-Q not only accepts the results but also congratulates the successful
candidates."

Hussain said by giving permission to the international observers, the
government had proved it was capable of holding transparent elections. "I
have already said that my party is ready to sit in the opposition. The
future strategy will be devised in consultation with the party bigwigs in
the coming few days," he said.

The PML-Q chief said he would not contest the Senate election after being
defeated in two constituencies. He asked Nawaz Sharif to honour his promise
of reinstating the deposed judiciary. He said the people changed their
priorities after coming into power and Sharif would also change his policies
regarding the deposed judges by presenting lame excuses. "We will see
whether Nawaz Sharif honours his promise or not," he remarked.

Sharif aide asks Musharraf to resign

A close aide of PML-N leader, Makhdoom Javed Hashmi has said that before
forming coalition government, issues pertaining to reinstatement of the
former chief justice and other deposed judges as well as fate of the
president should be settled. In an interview with a private TV channel, he
said: "We will have to reinstate Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry
and President Musharraf will have to go."

Hashmi said that the matters pertaining to freedom of media would also be
resolved. He expressed his confidence that Sharif could solve the issue of
future prime minister and the Punjab chief minister. He said that two/three
issues would have to be sorted out before entering into a coalition with the
PPP to form the government. "We will have to decide whether we can work
under Musharraf or not. Our party's position is quite clear on these
issues."

Observer group declares electoral process transparent

An international observer group invited by the Centre for Media and
Democracy (CMD) Pakistan to monitor the polling procedure on February 18 has
declared the general elections transparent. Addressing a press conference
after completion of visits to different destinations to monitor the polling,
the 20-member delegation from seven important countries said the polling was
conducted across Pakistan in a reasonably safe and secure environment,
thanks to the large-scale deployment of security forces.

"We were amazed to learn that we were the first international observers to
visit Hyderabad and most far-flung parts of the country. We found the
polling procedures a sufficiently transparent and the group recorded that
the will of the people was reasonably well expressed on the polling day.
Although the turnout was rather low, it was healthy," said the observers.

The group said although the polls were far from being perfect, the election
process marks a significant advance towards the establishment of full
democracy in Pakistan. They said that the presence of army and other
security forces should be necessary in a democratic exercise.

The observers said that a comprehensive report will be issued in the coming
days and apart from other things, it will suggest improvements in the
election process. The group made it clear that though they were hosted by
the CMD, they were utterly independent in recoding its observations. They
said they had visited Karachi, Hyderabad, Faisalabad, Peshawar, Quetta,
Lahore and many other important destinations.

The observers included head of the observers mission Thomas George Houlahamn
from US, Ruth Hopkins from UK, Allan Bird from Canada, Godelief Swank, Maria
Lucas, Piet Halma and Sabra Bano from Holland, Mailica Bogdanov, Elena
Pleskonijic, Susan Jordovic, Milan Tavcar from Serbia, Eric Ellis from
Australia, Alexander Semmett and Kirill Chatrov from Canada, Magdalena De
Meyer and Mustajab Rao from Belgium.

Musharraf opponents can amend constitution

The PPP, PML-N and their likeminded parties have clinched more than a
two-thirds majority in the National Assembly, required to amend the
constitution of the country.

The total strength of supporters of constitutional amendments inserted by
Musharraf is around 50 in the 272 directly contested seats. These mainly
include the PML-Q and MQM. However, in the new arrangement at the federal
and provincial levels, the MQM may change its mind.

All the remaining MPs-elect belonging to the PPP, PML-N and Awami National
Party (ANP) and over two dozen independents form the other bloc, by and
large support the restoration of deposed judges and doing away with
constitutional amendments. Their number crosses the two-thirds majority of
the directly fought seats.

However, at the moment all the winning parties do not have the two-thirds
majority in the Senate, the upper house of the Parliament where the PML-Q
has the simple majority with a negligible margin. But since the continuation
of the PML-Q lot with its party seems impossible in the changed situation,
most of its senators are likely to switch to the PML-N enabling the
victorious parties to also get the two-thirds majority in the Senate. The
PPP, PML-N and MMA already have a sizable strength in the Senate.

After having gained the required number, it is now for the winning parties
to take the collective decision for the restoration of the deposed judges by
dispensing with the November 3, 2007 Provisional Constitution Order (PCO)
and bringing the constitution to its October 12, 1999 shape. This has been
the major campaign slogan of the PML-N. However, the PPP used to have a
different view on these issues.

In 1998, all the parliamentary parties had joined hands to unanimously
cancel the controversial Eighth Amendment by passing the 14th amendment in
both chambers of Parliament within minutes.

On this constitutional coup, the-then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
Sajjad Ali Shah had locked horns with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on a
prodding from the-then President Farooq Leghari. The 14th amendment had
rendered the president a figurehead as envisaged in the original 1973
constitution.