Pakistan in Media

The MQM chief has stated that he has forgiven Mian Nawaz Sharif, army officers, intelligence outfits and anyone else involved in the 1992 operation against his party. This is in some ways at least a magnanimous gesture given that Altaf Hussain had lost close relatives in the action and had himself been forced to flee the country. The charges pertaining to the Karachi operation had been raised in a campaign that the PML-N alleges was intended to damage it. The statement from Altaf Hussain suggests we may be ready to move on and that the acrimony between the two parties could ease. At a time when many developments are unfolding all at once, it is to be seen what this leads to. There must also be some question as to whether forgiveness from an individual can wipe clean the slate as far as collective crimes committed against many go. Principle demands that those behind violence be brought to book and made to account for their misdeeds. This rule should of course apply across the board.

The MQM chief has also spoken of a truth and reconciliation commission to look into misdeeds from our past, including the martial laws that have been imposed. The idea of such a commission, borrowed from the one set up some 15 years ago as the apartheid era faded out in South Africa, is one that has taken the fancy of many of our politicians. The fact though is that our situation is quite different to that of South Africa which faced enormous challenges as it planned a collective future for a population made up of many races. It is also a fact that this commission was not entirely a success and has in the recent past received mixed reactions. What Pakistan needs most of all is adherence to our Constitution and the law. This would set in place important precedents that would serve us well in the future and prevent a descent into the kind of mayhem that struck Karachi in 1992.
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Regardless of a legacy of confrontation, if the two main political forces in the country are unable to define the parameters of their coexistence, the rest will become entirely secondary

Consider this: Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rehman Malik was on a visit to Saudi Arabia last week followed by another visitor, Pakistan’s former President Pervez Musharraf who arrived for his audience with King Abdullah. And now we have news reports that the PMLN chief Mian Nawaz Sharif is likely to fly to the same destination fairly soon.
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The News International,Pakistan, Saturday, July 18, 2009
Zardari, Nawaz agree to repeal 17th Amendment; PML-N Quaid wants PPP to consult legal experts on Musharraf’s trial; expresses concern over price-hike, drone attacks, Balochistan situation; seeks amendments to LGO; Zardari assures Nawaz of accommodating PML-N suggestions.

LAHORE: President Asif Ali Zardari and PML-N Quaid Nawaz Sharif, during their marathon meeting here on Friday, reached consensus on repealing the 17th Amendment, securing the reserved seats for women and the joint electorate in the light of an accord, reached between the two parties under the Charter of Democracy.

The PML-N leader reportedly also asked the president to improve the government’s performance or else growing public anger might pose a grave threat to democracy in the country. The two leaders, along with their close aides, had a lunch together at Nawaz Sharif’s Raiwind residence and discussed a number of issues of national and international significance.
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The News International, Pakistan, Thursday, July 16, 2009
LAHORE: The Pakistan Muslim League has demanded resignation from its MPA Shumaila Rana due to her involvement in a theft case. An investigation team of the PML-N has urged Shumaila Rana to tender her resignation, as her scam has raised questions regarding the party’s credibility before the general public.

Meanwhile, Shumaila, after refusing to resign from the Punjab Assembly, has asked for a two-day time by stating that a conspiracy had been hatched against her to malign the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz as well as her character.

The PML-N investigation team has affirmed that if she was innocent, then she has to face the media to prove her innocence. The party’s central leader Zulfiqar Khosa has stated that the decision to seek resignation from Shumaila Rana was taken because of her failure to prove her innocence before the committee.
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The News International, Pakistan, Friday, July 10, 2009
The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) is set to challenge the imposition of the Petroleum Development Levy in the Supreme Court today (Friday) to counter the second move of the government to increase the prices of petroleum products through a presidential ordinance.

PML-N spokesperson Siddiqul Farooq would file a petition in the apex court under Article 184 (3) of the Constitution through his counsel Muhammad Ikram Chaudhry, senior advocate of the Supreme Court.

Engineer Iqbal Zafar Jhagra had challenged the recent increase in the prices of petroleum products and the case is pending before the court. The court has already suspended the imposition of Carbon Tax, levied by the government
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The News International, Pakistan, Sunday, July 05, 2009
The PML-N chief has said the much heralded Charter of Democracy (CoD) signed between his party and the PPP had been reduced to nothing more than a 'piece of paper'. Mian Nawaz Sharif, speaking in London, certainly has grounds for his words. The terms of the CoD in fact seem to have been largely forgotten by the ruling party. Today, on the 17 amendment that the PPP had once sworn to do away with, even the prime minister, who would benefit most if it was scrapped, speaks of the need to maintain a 'balance of powers.' Evidently the party has changed its line on this issue.
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The News International, Pakistan, Friday, July 03, 2009
ISLAMABAD: Top Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leaders will seriously question in the next party meeting its senior stalwarts, including Makhdoom Javed Hashmi, about their support to the division of the Punjab. “The issue will come up in the next PML-N meeting to be presided over by Nawaz Sharif,” PML-N Information Secretary Ahsan Iqbal confirmed to The News.
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The News International, Pakistan, Tuesday, June 30, 2009
LAHORE: The Punjab Assembly on Monday witnessed complete mayhem after Prisons Minister Ch Abdul Ghafoor manhandled a woman legislator of the PML-Q for displaying a banner against the chief minister.

Ghafoor embarrassed the entire treasury after he manhandled two women parliamentarians as well as used abusive language against Bushra Nawaz Gardezi. He hit headlines after his encounter with customs officials at the Allama Iqbal International Airport last month.
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The News International, Pakistan, Monnday, June 29, 2009
In a rare show of unity, parliamentarians from the PML-N and PML-Q put aside an often acrimonious rivalry to jointly oppose a proposal from the president that the water in the Taunsa-Punjnad canal be reduced or that it be closed to increase the flow of water to Sindh. This of course would cut down water to Punjab. The outcry against the suggestion is a familiar one. Disputes over water have in the past too locked provinces against each other. Indeed unresolved issues on this matter linger on. The titanic battle over the Kalabagh Dam – a project that has now been abandoned – was one example of how high feelings run. There have been fierce protests too in Sindh over the building of other waterways that would benefit Punjab but reduce flow in the Indus, affecting the southern province. The fierce onslaught launched by both factions of the PML brought a defensive response from the PPP. Raja Riaz, the leader of the opposition in the Punjab Assembly and also the provincial irrigation minister, vowed to resign if even ‘one per cent of water’ in the canal was reduced. The raising of the matter in the House indeed appeared to have caught the party, with which the president is still affiliated, rather off guard.
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The News International, Pakistan, Sunday, June 28, 2009
The tide seems to be running in favour of the PML-N chief Mian Nawaz Sharif being able to contest elections. A bench of the LHC has now acquitted him in a case involving the purchase of a helicopter. Nawaz Sharif had been convicted in 2000, sentenced to a jail term and a hefty fee, for the acquisition of the aircraft, on the grounds that the funds used for this were not covered in his declared assets.

The ruling of course means that Sharif can contest polls. Both the president and the prime minister have been quick to congratulate him on this. The more harmonious political environment put in place after the long march that ended with the restoration of the chief justice of Pakistan persists. This is welcome. The fact that the head of a major party can take part in the electoral process is also important. It acts to strengthen our struggling democracy and offer up greater choice of leadership to people. There is another aspect to all this. The LHC has noted many loopholes and flaws in the 2000 decision by a trial court. It is not hard to see that this may have been politically motivated. We are all of course familiar with the mechanics of this. Similar accusations have surfaced in the past and indeed are also coming forward in the case involving the alleged hijacking of an aircraft by Nawaz Sharif in 1999.
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Daily Times, Pakistan, Thursday, June 25, 2009
ISLAMABAD: The parliamentary committee on constitutional reforms has suffered its first setback without a single meeting, with the PML-N demanding a change in its nomenclature, and a limiting of its mandate. Speaking on a point of order, PML-N Information Secretary Ahsan Iqbal said the committee should be restricted to working only on repealing the 17th amendment.
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The News International, Pakistan, Friday, June 19, 2009
PML-N’s Khwaja Asif’s remarks against President Zardari triggered strong protest from the PPP legislators who in turn targeted the PML-N leadership. The speaker had to expunge remarks against the president.

Khwaja Asif accused President Zardari of bringing back politics of confrontation, saying the advocate-general of Sindh has presented the pardon documents in the court on the instructions of President Zardari. “If they continue character assassination of our leadership then we will also tell the people how Farooq H Naek brought the NRO before us to give indemnity to Gen Musharraf,” he added. He said the president lacks credibility and no body trusts him.
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The News International, Pakistan

Monday, June 15, 2009
More than eight years after the controversy over the alleged ‘hijacking’ of a commercial plane carrying then COAS General Pervez Musharraf made headlines amidst the dramatic overthrowing of the second PML-N government, the issue has crept back out of dusty files. The Sindh government has placed before the apex court documents which reveal the details of the exile accord reached between the Sharifs and the military-led setup, allowing them at the end of 2000 to exchange prison cells for a Saudi palace. There had for years been debate over the contents of the deal, with the Sharifs claiming they went into ‘forced exile’, after being convicted in the plane diversion case by an Anti-Terrorism Court. Mian Nawaz Sharif had at the time refused to appeal a life sentence in the case, upheld by the Sindh High Court, on the basis that he lacked confidence that the judiciary which had taken oath under a PCO was independent.
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Daily Times, Pakistan
Wednesday, June 10, 2009

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Nawaz Sharif cannot contest polls until an appeal against his conviction in the plane hijacking conspiracy cases is under adjudication in the Supreme Court (SC), said Sindh Advocate General Muhammad Yousaf Leghari on Tuesday. Talking to reporters on the SC premises, the AG said, “Not in my official capacity, but in my personal opinion, Nawaz cannot contest polls as long as his appeal ... is under adjudication before the SC.” masood rehman

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Daily Times, Pakistan
Wednesday, June 10, 2009

* Sindh government presents record before Supreme Court
* PML-N chief left country of his own accord for 10 years

By Masood Rehman

ISLAMABAD: The Sindh government on Tuesday presented before the Supreme Court records of a presidential pardon granted to Nawaz Sharif, remission of his sentence and undertakings signed by the PML-N chief.

Dawn, Pakistan
Monday, 08 Jun, 2009

This underscores a bigger malady: the difficulty of enforcing rules for legislators. Nobody knows how many parliamentarians at the federal and provincial levels are facing criminal charges of various intensities and different types. Their number is expected to be quite high. In the last two weeks alone, two ruling party legislators in Punjab were alleged to have committed such heinous crimes as harassing women and committing rape at gunpoint. A sense of immunity from prosecution and punishment is at work in these cases. Allowing Mr Ghafoor to walk away with this clear violation of the rules, even if he did not know them, will certainly allow other legislators to believe they can get away with anything.

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Daily Times Monitor

LAHORE: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Nawaz Sharif was not pardoned in the plane hijacking case. Instead his sentence was remitted, a private TV channel reported on Monday.

The channel claimed to have limited access to a presidential document that had apparently pardoned the PML-N chief in the plane hijacking case. The document – soon to be placed before the Supreme Court by the government – showed that while Nawaz was exempted from serving the sentence in the hijacking case, his status as a convict was not changed by the then president, according to the channel.

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Saturday, June 06, 2009
misdemeanour

The inquiry commission set up to look into the incident involving a Punjab government minister who refused to allow the baggage of a friend who had arrived at Lahore airport from Bangkok to be scanned is instructive. Rather than looking into facts, a main focus for the inquiry commission, comprising two former MNAs and two bureaucrats, seems to have been to clear the minister at all costs. The media reports concerning the airport incident, which involved an exchange of harsh words between Chaudhry Abdul Ghafoor, the concerned minister, and customs staff, had insinuated he whisked away his friend's luggage to cover up a smuggling attempt. These reports could indeed be inaccurate. The media, we must admit, is not always right and not always entirely balanced. But the conclusion reached in the report is ludicrous. It maintains the minister had no notion that taking the 'Green Channel' option at airports did not mean custom's had no right to search baggage. Had this indeed been the case, smuggling of banned items – including narcotics – would be child's play for criminal elements around the world. It seems hard to believe this did not strike a man who deals regularly with law-breakers in his role as prison's minister.

Given that a public scene of considerable ugliness took place at the airport, the finding by the inquiry commission that the media 'blew the incident out of proportion' also seems entirely unfair. It is of course the primary task of the media to act as a watchdog and keep the public informed. It may sometimes make mistakes, but the commission's report does nothing to persuade us that this is indeed what happened in the case of the unpleasant matter at hand. There is no explanation as to why the minister lost his cool. The setting up of the inquiry commission marks some progress. At least such happenings are no longer brushed under the carpet or robustly denied. For this, the media deserves credit. The fact that the skirmish at the airport was broadcast by TV channels forced the government to react. But there is still a long way to go. If they are to acquire credibility, such inquiries must genuinely aim at seeking out the facts. Conducting them merely as an eye-wash does more harm than good. The reputation of the minister will not be salvaged by a report no one believes. This is something we need to realize so that we can move towards a system based on real accountability and the good governance that comes with it.

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By CHRIS BRUMMITT, Associated Press Writer
Tue, May 26, 2009

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's top court on Tuesday lifted a ban on popular opposition leader Nawaz Sharif contesting elections, paving the way for his return to parliament and removing the first major barrier to him becoming prime minister for a third time.

Sharif is key to the hopes of Pakistan's Western allies that its moderate political parties will unite to fight the Islamic extremists who are destabilizing the nuclear-armed country as well as threatening the success of the U.S.-led mission in neighboring Afghanistan.

The ruling came as Pakistan's army claimed more gains in a month-long offensive in the northwestern Swat Valley and surrounding districts that has been welcomed by foreign governments but has displaced more than 2 million people from their homes.

Judges at the Supreme Court overturned an earlier ruling banning Sharif from elected office because of a criminal conviction dating to 2000 that he and most analysts say was politically motivated. They said it was a "miscarriage of justice," but gave no reason.

Sharif gave no hint of his political plans in a news conference minutes after the verdict, but he is now free to return to parliament by contesting a by-election when a seat becomes available. To become prime minister in polls in 2013, he would have to lobby lawmakers to overturn a constitutional bar on holding the position three times — something his party has long demanded.

"I would like to salute the people of Pakistan again because they, with great effort and struggle, fought for the independence of the judiciary," said Sharif, whom opinion polls easily show as the country's most popular politician. "I would like to thank God almighty."

Sharif's party came second in parliamentary elections last year, behind the party of President Asif Ali Zardari. The two parties originally formed a government together, but after two months Sharif's grouping became the opposition, accusing Zardari of reneging on a vow to restore judges fired by former President Pervez Musharraf.

Media reports quoting unnamed U.S. officials early this year suggested the United States was trying to encourage the increasingly unpopular Zardari to give more power to Sharif as a way of shoring up the country's moderate center.

Zardari, the widower of assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and the head of Pakistan's largest party, has cultivated ties with the U.S. and sought to rally Pakistanis behind the fight against Islamic extremists. But his popularity began withering soon after he assumed office a year ago amid a punishing economic crisis and persistent terror attacks.

Critics say Sharif remains close to conservative Muslim factions that are not so vocal in their opposition to the Taliban and see the conflict as "America's War," but his party is secular and supports the government's offensive against the militants in the Swat Valley.

"America's interest is in keeping these two major political parties on the same page in the war on terror," said Rasul Bakhsh Rais, professor of political science at Lahore University of Management Sciences.

Sharif has said he will not destabilize Zardari's government or campaign for early elections, but given the turbulent nature of Pakistani politics, that could change. Since its creation in 1947, only one government in Pakistan has seen through its five-year term.

Rais said he thought Sharif would wait until to 2013 — assuming he won the right — to run for prime minister. He noted that current Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was popular among most parties. Instead, he predicted that Sharif would make a renewed push to roll back some of the powers that Zardari inherited from Musharraf.

Earlier this year, the Supreme Court ruled Sharif was not eligible for office, a decision it said was final.

But in response Sharif led nationwide protests against the government, which backed down and allowed him to appeal the decision — a move praised by the United States and Britain.

It also agreed to reinstate the chief justice, another key demand of Sharif.

Sharif returned from exile in 2007 seeking to contest elections, but was disqualified by a court because of a prior criminal conviction on terrorism and hijacking charges stemming from the 1999 coup against Sharif's government by then-Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

The army meanwhile said government troops had reclaimed control of more than half of the biggest town in the Swat Valley, Mingora, and had scared off local recruits who had initially joined with the Taliban.

"The information we have so far from intelligence and other sources is that militants' morale is down, they are panicked and they are trying to flee from different parts" of the valley, said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas.

The military account of the campaign is impossible to verify because the battle zone is largely sealed off to reporters. The military says it has killed about 1,100 suspected insurgents and kept civilian casualties to a minimum. Witnesses have described widespread civilian casualties.

Elsewhere in the northwest, intelligence officials said Pakistani troops backed by helicopter gunships attacked suspected militant hide-outs in two villages in South Waziristan, killing at least six insurgents and wounding 12 others. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.

Syed Mohsin Shah, the top government official in nearby Dera Ismail Khan district, said some 1,500 families have fled from South Waziristan in the past few weeks because of fighting between the two sides.

Aid officials fear a second refugee crisis could emerge in the fighting worsens in Waziristan.

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