KARACHI, 22 June — Signals from the dissidents (the members of the breakaway Pakistan Muslim League faction led by Mian Azhar) that they were willing to ally themselves once again with Nawaz Sharif have cheered the pro-Sharif leaders of the party.
Over the past two days leaders of the like-minded group have found little trouble articulating the sense of betrayal they felt over the dissolution of the federal and provincial assemblies. Most of them now openly blame Mian Azhar, the uncrowned head of the PML dissidents, for misguiding them on the issue of the assemblies and fueling false hope that these democratic institutions would be allowed to function despite the ouster of the elected prime minister and their party leader.
These leaders are expected to ditch Mian Azhar very soon and naturally the news has made Sharif’s loyalists gloat over their Pyrrhic victory.
Senior party officials including Ejazul Haq, Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi and Gohar Ayub Khan lashed out at Mian Azhar in their party’s meeting held in Islamabad.
Speaking on condition of anonymity a member of the like-minded group said that his faction leaders had charged Azhar with misleading them as far as restoration of assemblies was concerned. “A majority of the leaders were basically supporting Azhar against Sharif because of the shade of hope he provided about the revival of the federal and provincial legislatures.”
The like-minded group will work out a fresh program to decide independently their future course of action. The option therefore of rejoining Sharif’s party is considered a good one.
In Islamabad the acting president of the PML, Javed Hashmi, announced that the final round against the military regime had begun now that Musharraf had appointed himself president. Minutes before going into a scheduled party meeting, Hashmi said that with “Pervez Musharraf’s term as president of Pakistan for five years, the 1973 Constitution which was held in abeyance is now finally buried.”
“Under the PCO every word and order of the dictator has become the constitution.”
The PML leader said that under the Eighth Amendment of the constitution, the senate was named as an institution which had to continue at every cost. Similarly the speakers of the National Assembly and Senate must remain at their posts. But, he said, Musharraf with a single stroke of the pen has discarded these laws.
