US hopes pinned on Musharraf
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI -
Since assuming office at the beginning of the year, Pakistan's coalition civilian government has gone to extreme lengths to develop a consensus for the impeachment of President Pervez Musharraf, the general who until February had ruled the country after staging a coup in 1999.
The coalition, led by the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), want Musharraf to be held accountable for last year imposing a state of emergency and sacking the judiciary.
To reassure Washington and secure its continued support,
the politicians even tried to clip the wings of the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence, and sent Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on an unscheduled visit to the United States in an attempt to convince the George W Bush administration that the "war on terror" could be fought without Musharraf.
Washington, however, has other ideas, and Musharraf remains central to them as the point man for smooth and direct coordination between Pakistani and American forces to sort out the Taliban's and al-Qaeda's sanctuaries in North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and beyond on the border areas with Afghanistan. These sanctuaries are vital in supporting the Taliban-led insurgency in that country.
Bickering between the PPP and the PML-N has to date prevented them from agreeing on Musharraf's impeachment, but intense negotiations over the past few days are expected to result in a united move to have him removed from office. In this tense situation, Musharraf canceled a trip to Beijing to attend the opening of the Summer Olympic Games on Friday, but then reports emerged that he would attend the ceremony.
Washington will be watching developments with acute interest. Since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Musharraf has sided with the US in its "war on terror", and
Washington believes he is still the man to deliver.
Musharraf stepped down as chief of the army last November and officially holds few executive powers - these reside in the prime minister's office.
However, Musharraf retains support in the military and in the civilian bureaucracy.
Beyond loyalty to the man himself, he is a force to be reckoned with as American economic and military aid worth billions of dollars flows though the president's office.
Washington has gone as far as telling the new army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani, and Premier Gilani that its contact is Musharraf, through whom the money flows. Major General Mehmood Ali Durrani, the national security advisor and immediate past Pakistani ambassador to Washington, is second overseer of the aid money and looks after operational matters related to their distribution.
It is these men the Bush administration wants in a renewed effort to once and for all deal with the militancy in NWFP and the tribal areas.
Acting US Central Command commander Lieutenant General Martin Dempsey and Central Intelligence Agency deputy director Stephen Kappes recently visited Pakistan. Contacts familiar with these developments tell Asia Times Online that several approaches to the NWFP were discussed.
One was that "extraordinary measures" might be adopted, under which the president would exercise extraordinary powers embedded in the constitution to abandon all provincial assemblies and instead of holding fresh elections impose a state of emergency in the country, citing militant-led violence in the NWFP.
Another approach would be to use the existing democratic system and somehow install the sub-Pashtun nationalist and secular Awami National Party (ANP), led by Asfandyar Wali Khan, in the government.
First, though, the ANP, which rules the NWFP, would have to be given special powers to deal with the militancy in its province. This would be done through the president's office in Islamabad. The relatively liberal ANP is anti-Taliban and supported the pro-Russian government in Afghanistan in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Much then depends on Musharraf retaining his position, and how the Taliban and al-Qaeda respond to any increased powers that the ANP administration might turn against them.
Syed Saleem Shahzad is Asia Times Online's Pakistan Bureau Chief. He can be reached at
saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
Asia Times Online :: South Asia news, business and economy from India and Pakistan
Talk about paranoia. for starters: Arcelor-Mittal is a European comany. Not Indian.
Zardari
. You wont have stability when you have traitors among you, I warned you that killing leader will not resolve the issues in Baluchistan or NWFP, what did Musharraf end up doing was Murdering Bugti and other prominent leader, he discarded the Judiciary, he put in a new Judiciary that was made of yes sir's and goonda agenda, he did this all for his stay in power. I cant even start on the mess he left in Baluchistan, NWFP, Sindh, Punjab and Azaad Kashmir
, he needs to leave quietly as he has done enough damage.
