Bhutto's party delays decision on prime minister

The party of murdered opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has deferred a decision on who should become Pakistan’s prime minister, deepening uncertainty about how a new government will handle President Pervez Musharraf.

Ms Bhutto’s party, which finished first in last month’s general elections, had been expected to nominate Makhdoom Amin Fahim, a long-time Bhutto aide from her home province of Sindh, as its candidate for the premiership.

However, a meeting of its newly elected MPs at the home of her widower broke up yesterday without even discussing the merits of the four main candidates, participants said.

“The consultation process will continue,” Mr Fahim told reporters as he left, shrugging off questions about the cause of the delay. “This is democracy.”

MPs said Asif Ali Zardari, Ms Bhutto’s husband and co-chairman of the People’s Party, had told them he would discuss the nomination with them in small groups in the next few days before making a decision.

Moderate, secular parties routed Islamists as well as the former ruling party of Mr Musharraf in the February 18 elections, prompting calls for Mr Musharraf to resign.

However, the US-backed president is resisting, raising the risk of more political turbulence in Pakistan just as it faces surging Islamic militancy and looming economic problems.

Mr Musharraf, who retired as army chief in November to become a purely civilian president, is expected to convene parliament later this month and invite the People’s Party to form a government.

The party wants to form a coalition including the supporters of another former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, and cut back the sweeping powers accumulated by Mr Musharraf in eight years of military rule.

Mr Musharraf’s hand-picked army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, told a meeting of top army commanders yesterday that the military would support the next government.

The army “fully stands behind the democratic process and is committed to play its constitutional role in support of the elected government”, a military statement quoted him as saying.

Gen Kayani also said the army would “stay out of the political process”, the statement said.

The new government is likely to try to remove the presidential power to fire the prime minister and dissolve the assemblies. It may also abolish the National Security Council, which gave the military a formal say in security policy.

However, Ms Bhutto’s party has steered away from an open confrontation with Mr Musharraf, whose crackdown on the media and the judiciary last year has left him politically isolated and deeply unpopular.

The most ticklish issue is whether to restore Supreme Court judges purged after Mr Musharraf declared emergency rule in November. The court was about to rule on the legality of his re-election as president the month before.

The United States and other foreign backers hope Pakistan’s new government will prove a stable partner committed to preventing al-Qaida and the Taliban from mounting attacks in Afghanistan and the West.