Musharraf faces election setback

[David Octavius]

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Musharraf faces election setback

Pakistan's presidential election can go ahead as planned on Saturday, but the legality of President Musharraf's bid is still in doubt.
The Supreme Court says that no winner can be announced until it has ruled on whether Gen Musharraf can stand for re-election while still army chief.
The court wants more time to consider the arguments.

The move comes as ex-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto is expected to seal a reconciliation deal with Gen Musharraf.

Corruption charges against Ms Bhutto would be dropped, opening the way to a possible power-sharing agreement that Gen Musharraf hopes would add credibility to his government.

Ms Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party is the largest in the country.
Pakistan has been engulfed in political fighting in recent months, at the same time as the security forces have suffered a series of blows from pro-Taleban militants opposed to Gen Musharraf's support for the US-led "war on terror".

'Not issued'

Friday's ruling by the court throws the presidential election into confusion.
President Musharraf is expected to be able to easily muster a majority in the national parliament and four provincial assemblies that select the president.

But the court ruling means that even if he gets most votes, he cannot be declared winner until the court has decided if he was a valid candidate in the first place.

"The bench has unanimously resolved and directed that the election process should proceed as per the schedule announced by the chief election commissioner," chief judge Javed Iqbal said, the AFP news agency reports.

"But final notification of the returning candidate will not be issued until the decision of this petition for which the process is to begin from 17 October."
That date coincides with the end of the Eid festival. It also coincides with the day that Benazir Bhutto says she will return from years of self-imposed exile.

Correspondents say Gen Musharraf was waiting for the court's verdict before formalising a power sharing deal with Ms Bhutto.
This would pave the way for Ms Bhutto's return to contest forthcoming parliamentary elections scheduled to be held by mid-January.

Last week the court dismissed a number of earlier objections filed by Gen Musharraf's opponents on technical grounds.

That led to fresh petitions being filed this week.

Another world leader trying to hold on to power (see Putin) - we talk about Democracy a lot, yet some of our biggest so called Allies are the most oppressive leaders in the world - go figure eh?

[motivez]

Wow, missed this thread.

Pakistan is a special case though, I think like in Iraq with Saddam, Musharraf is one of the few things keeping it from being run by religious zealots.. so while he's certainly not the basis for which we want blossoming Democracies to model themselves, he is one of the things standing in the way of a nuclear armed Islamic theocracy..

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by motivez

Wow, missed this thread.

Pakistan is a special case though, I think like in Iraq with Saddam, Musharraf is one of the few things keeping it from being run by religious zealots.. so while he's certainly not the basis for which we want blossoming Democracies to model themselves, he is one of the things standing in the way of a nuclear armed Islamic theocracy..

But Saddam thought that the people who put him in power would not take him out. And he did it twice! That is being really dumb!

But you do get it. A West friendly Pakistan is way more important that Osama and his cave dwellers.

[David Octavius]

Originally Posted by RMNIXON

But Saddam thought that the people who put him in power would not take him out. And he did it twice! That is being really dumb!

But you do get it. A West friendly Pakistan is way more important that Osama and his cave dwellers.

I agree but its a tightrope...are we willing to support Perez at the expensive of democratic elections for millions of Muslims and then still take the high road and say we are "freedom fighters"? That kind of hypocrisy may be lost here but certainly the terrorists will use this to rally more support to their side against us.

Their main selling point is that we try to exert our hegemony on them and oppress them, this would certainly play into that propaganda.

[RMNIXON]

A very prickly situation!