ISLAMABAD, 20 November 2007 — Pakistan’s reconstituted Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, rejected several petitions challenging Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s re-election as president yesterday, thus paving the way for Musharraf to quit as army chief and restoring civilian rule.
The top court took just over two hours to throw out the cases. Musharraf has promised to hang up his uniform — one of the key demands of the opposition and the international community — as soon as his victory in last month’s presidential election is validated.
“There were five petitions, they have all been dismissed. There is only one left and that will be heard on Thursday,” Attorney General Malik Mohammad Qayyum said.
“The notification of the president’s election cannot be issued because a petition is still pending. Hopefully, it will be done after that,” Qayyum added.
It was reported that Musharraf will arrive in Saudi Arabia today. According to the Saudi Press Agency, he will meet Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah in Riyadh.
“King Abdullah and President Musharraf would discuss bilateral relations and a number of regional and international issues,” said SPA on its English website. It said Musharraf would also visit Makkah to perform Umrah.
Speculation was rife in the Pakistani media yesterday that Musharraf would discuss with the Saudi leadership the issue of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s return to Pakistan. Sharif, who lives in exile in Jeddah as a Saudi state guest, had attempted to return to Pakistan after the Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry-led Supreme Court ruled last month that he was free to stay in Pakistan, but Musharraf forced him back to Saudi Arabia.
Talking to Reuters yesterday, Sharif said he would not meet Musharraf. “No, no, no,” he told the news agency when asked if he would meet or have any contact with Musharraf during his Saudi visit.
“What am I supposed to talk to him about? He would have to accept all the opposition’s demands first,” Sharif said. Top on the list of opposition demands is the reinstatement of Chaudhry as the chief justice. Sharif said there was no chance of a fair election under emergency rule. “It is impossible to conduct a campaign. The circumstances are not conducive to any campaigning for the election. People are behind bars, politicians and judges have been locked up... to even think of elections under these circumstances is unrealistic,” said Sharif.
The court rulings came after the Pakistan’s Peoples’ Party of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto said it was withdrawing its own challenge against Musharraf’s presidency as it did not recognize the new court.
At the same time, Benazir met the US ambassador to Pakistan after Washington urged her and Musharraf to restart power-sharing talks broken off after he declared emergency rule.
After last week calling on Musharraf to quit and vowing never to work with him in government, Benazir said she saw little hope of resuming the talks that had enabled her to return to the country last month. “We are not going back to the former track,” she told reporters.
Earlier, Musharraf made a recommendation to the Election Commission that long-promised parliamentary polls be held on Jan. 8. But Pakistan’s key opposition parties yesterday failed to attend a meeting called by the commission to finalize a code of conduct for general elections, officials and state media said.
Opposition parties have said they are mulling a boycott of the election. State media quoted Musharraf defending the emergency as “in the interest of the country” and hitting out at opposition parties mulling a boycott of the polls if they are held under emergency laws.
— Additional input from agencies
