Musharraf 'will step down as army chief': Bhutto

Pakistan’s exiled former premier, Benazir Bhutto, said Gen Pervez Musharraf had agreed to step down as army chief in a move she believed would happen before the next presidential election.

Such an agreement would be a key step forward in political negotiations for a power-sharing deal with the opposition.

In a telephone interview, she added that corruption charges would be dropped against her and dozens of other parliamentarians as part of ongoing negotiations to restore civilian rule.

Musharraf and Bhutto, a two-time prime minister, have been in talks for months about a pact that would protect the general’s troubled re-election bid from looming legal challenges and public disenchantment with military rule.

In return, Musharraf is expected to give up his role as army chief, and Bhutto will return to contest parliamentary elections.

“We’re very pleased that Gen Musharraf has taken the decision to listen to the people of Pakistan by taking the decision to take off the uniform,” Bhutto said. “I expect that he will step down (as army chief) before the presidential elections, but that is for the president to say.”

There was no immediate reaction from Musharraf to Bhutto’s comments.

Earlier, a close Musharraf ally, Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, confirmed the two sides had reached an agreement regarding Musharraf’s military role.

Envoys for the US-allied president have been trying to work out a pact that would rescue his bid for another presidential term.

Bhutto and other opposition leaders argue the constitution obliges Musharraf, who seized power in a coup in 1999, to give up his post as military chief before he asks lawmakers for a fresh mandate in September or October.

Musharraf has said the constitution allows him to be army chief until the end of 2007. He has not said what will happen after that.

A remaining stumbling block in a power-sharing deal is the balance of power between Parliament and the president, who has the power to sack the prime minister and dissolve the legislature.

Bhutto fears future leaders could be sacked again.

Bhutto said she hoped for a breakthrough in the negotiations “in the next few days” and that Musharraf’s silence on his decision to step down as military chief “could be a tactical rather that strategic retreat” until all issues have been resolved.

“Time is running out,” she said, warning that a breakdown in talks could spark street protests in Pakistan.

Musharraf has seen his authority erode since March, when he tried unsuccessfully to remove the Supreme Court’s top judge.

The move triggered protests that grew into a broad campaign against his continued rule.

The court reinstated the judge in July, raising expectations that it will uphold legal challenges to Musharraf’s re-election. The court yesterday admitted a petition filed by Qazi Hussain Ahmad, head of the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party, against Musharraf’s dual role as president and military chief.

Last week, the court ruled that Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister toppled in 1999 who is also living in exile, can return to Pakistan ahead of parliamentary elections due by January.

Sharif quickly denounced Musharraf as a dictator who must be removed from the political scene.

The prospect of Sharif making a tumultuous return has added to the urgency of an accommodation between Musharraf and Bhutto, who share a relatively liberal, pro-Western outlook and stress the need to prevent the political crisis from destabilising the nuclear-armed nation.

“I can foresee the external and internal threats and the vested interests that want to create an atmosphere of uncertainty, and urge the people to be wary of it,” Musharraf said.

Musharraf had vowed to prevent either former leader from re-entering Pakistan.

He says they are to blame them for the corruption and economic problems that nearly bankrupted the country in the 1990s, when Bhutto and Sharif each had two short-lived turns as prime minister.

Bhutto said dropping corruption charges against her was another hurdle that had been cleared.

“There has been progress on this issue of dropping the charges – not just against me but against some 80 other parliamentarians,” she said. “These charges were never proven and there has been an agreement that this is needed for reconciliation and to move forward.”

With the United States pressing for more democracy as well as a redoubled effort against al-Qaida and Taliban militants near the Afghan border, Musharraf recently began calling for political reconciliation with Bhutto and an alliance of moderates to defeat extremists.

But Bhutto has criticised Pakistan’s government for allowing tribal areas to fall into the hands of pro Taliban elements.

She has also accused elements in Pakistan’s intelligence and security services of protecting and supporting extremists.

Bhutto – daughter of Pakistan’s former president and prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was overthrown by the military and hanged in 1979 – would not say when she last spoke to Musharraf.

Party officials outside of London said the two last met at the end of July in Abu Dhabi.