General Uncertainty

AFP, "Bhutto party delays Pakistan PM decision" - AFP - Islamabad, Pakistan
Thursday, March 6, 2008

The Pakistan People's Party, which won the most seats in the February 18 parliamentary polls, failed to agree on a candidate because of discord over the frontrunner Makhdoom Amin Fahim, a stalwart Bhutto aide, party officials said.

The delay comes amid mounting uncertainty over how the new premier and his or her government will handle key US ally President Pervez Musharraf, whose allies were trounced by the PPP and the party of ex-premier Nawaz Sharif.

"It is up to the party leadership what decision they take," Fahim told reporters, flashing a victory sign as he left the meeting of the PPP's newly elected MPs in Islamabad.

Bhutto was killed in a suicide attack in the garrison city of Rawalpindi on December 27 and her widower and successor as party leader, Asif Ali Zardari, has said he is not standing for the premiership.

Party insiders said the dispute hinged on the fact that Fahim, the PPP's long-term vice-president, hails from the southern province of Sindh, the Bhutto clan's power base.

Some party leaders wanted a prime minister from Punjab province, which is home to more than half of the country's 160 million people and where Sharif's party outnumbered the PPP in provincial polls.

Sharif and Zardari have agreed to form a coalition in parliament, which is set to be convened in mid-March, but both parties will inevitably want to maintain their own strength, officials said.

The leading Punjabi contender is Ahmed Mukhtar, an industrialist who is close to Zardari and who defeated the chief of the pro-Musharraf party in the elections, party officials said.

However, insiders said it would be a tough decision to pass over Fahim, a poetry-loving 68-year-old who effectively led the party when Bhutto was in exile from 1999 to 2007.

Party officials said a decision may not be announced until parliament convenes.

The delay in choosing a premier comes amid general uncertainty about the political direction of the country and the fate of Musharraf in particular.

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[Picture: Makhdoom Amin Fahim]