Posted on 07/29/2007 6:29:20 PM PDT by blam
Benazir Bhutto sets price of Musharraf deal
By Isambard Wilkinson in Islamabad
Last Updated: 1:51am BST 30/07/2007
Pakistan's former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, said yesterday that President Pervez Musharraf would have to resign as military chief before any power-sharing agreement could be reached.
Talks were held between Gen Musharraf and Ms Bhutto, who lives in self-imposed exile, in Abu Dhabi on Friday.
Benazir Bhutto insists President Musharraf resign as military chief
"We do not accept President Musharraf in uniform," Ms Bhutto told a Pakistani television broadcaster. "Our stand is that, and I stick to my stand."
Western diplomats hope that an alliance between Gen Musharraf and Ms Bhutto will produce a broad-based secular government that might stem Pakistan's rising tide of Islamic militancy.
Ms Bhutto, whose two previous governments were dismissed amid allegations of corruption, and Gen Musharraf, an embattled ally in the US-led war on terror, have been engaged in faltering negotiations since 2002.
A key sticking point has been Gen Musharraf's reluctance to resign from the army, the source of his greatest strength, to meet opposition groups' demands for a return to civilian rule. A supreme court ruling last week to reinstate the chief justice, whom Gen Musharraf had attempted to sack, has cast doubt on his plans to be re-elected when his term expires in October and to remain in uniform.
The national assembly is scheduled to be dissolved in November and general elections should be held in December or January.
Ms Bhutto maintains that the general should seek re-election after parliamentary elections and that he should stand as a civilian.
Gen Musharraf's aides claim that he is prepared to give Ms Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party a share of power but it is not known whether he is prepared to offer the politically shrewd Ms Bhutto the post of prime minister.
Any deal would require changes to the constitution to lift a ban on anyone serving as prime minister more than twice and to shelve corruption charges against Ms Bhutto.
There was speculation that the two sides had agreed to an interim prime minister to oversee the election period, with reports suggesting that Hamid Nasir Chattha, a former parliamentary speaker, was being lined up for the job.
Ms Bhutto has said that she would return to Pakistan as early as September regardless of whether or not she had reached a deal with Gen Musharraf.
See also thread from earlier today ‘Musharraf to Quit as Chief of Army Staff’. Looks like it is a done deal, strengthening Pakistan’s stability and increasing the power of non-islamicists in general.
I don't like Musharaff. But I think Bhutto is probably worse.
I’m just surprised Musharraf isn’t dead by now.
ThaNKS !
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