ISLAMABAD, 11 July — Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has ordered the country’s first parliamentary elections since he seized power three years ago to be held on Oct. 10, state television and a top government official said yesterday. "I can confirm that they have been scheduled for the 10th of October," Information Ministry secretary Anwar Mahmood told reporters.
A special bulletin on state-run television announced that Musharraf had directed national and provincial elections to be held on Oct. 10. "National and Provincial Assembly elections have been announced for Oct. 10 under a presidential order," Pakistan Television (PTV) said late last night. The order was issued at a Cabinet meeting earlier in the day, PTV added.
Musharraf also plans more changes to the constitution despite an uproar over a series of decrees he has already issued that critics say cement his grip on power. A government statement quoted him as telling the Cabinet meeting that debate over the initial amendments suggested "things are turning for the better and are becoming clearer" for the people of Pakistan.
"These, he said, would get even better understood with the unfolding of the second package later this week," the official statement said without giving details. Musharraf is due to address the nation tomorrow and is expected to unveil further changes then.
Musharraf, the military ruler who seized power from prime minister Nawaz Sharif in October 1999, has repeatedly promised to hold elections by Oct. 12 in accordance with a May 2000 Supreme Court ruling. In its verdict the country’s top court directed the military government to hold elections before the third anniversary of the bloodless coup, and ordered it to announce the schedule three months beforehand.
"This announcement has not surprised us because it was expected," a spokesman for Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PML), Syed Zafar Ali Shah, told reporters. "Time was running out for Musharraf. He was bound to give this date." Musharraf was initially welcomed for overthrowing Sharif’s elected government, but he has drawn the ire of activists, observers and opposition parties in recent months with a rash of moves seen as a naked bid to cement his power.
On Saturday, he issued a ban on former prime ministers running for a third term, effectively eliminating ex-Premiers Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, after last month banning non-university graduates from contesting the polls.
The country is still simmering over a package of proposed constitutional amendments, unveiled on June 26, which invest the president with unprecedented powers to sack the elected prime minister and the lower house of Parliament.
Musharraf had already disgusted his critics when he handed himself an extra five years after an April 30 referendum which was plagued by allegations of multiple voting and manipulation. He has already banned parties from holding public rallies. Benazir’s Pakistan People’s Party vowed to deliver a "crushing blow" to the Musharraf regime in the upcoming polls.
