PAKISTAN: Defiant Sharif wants Pakistan to be free of "dictatorship"

Pakistan's former prime minister Nawaz Sharif says he wants to see "a democratic Pakistan, which is free of dictatorship". Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif said on Monday (November 26) he wants "a Pakistan free of dictatorship" and for all the state organisations and institutions to function independently. Sharif is due to file nomination papers on Monday for a January election but he may not take part unless President Pervez Musharrafemergency rule. He told a news conference he wanted an independent judiciary and a free media. Sharif, ousted by Musharraf eight years ago, flew home on Sunday (November 25), after living in exile. He says he feels the same love for the people of Pakistan as when he left. But General Musharraf, he said, had brought the country to the verge of disaster. Western governments fear Musharraf's emergency rule and moves to stifle democracy in Pakistan could give an advantage to Islamist militants threatening the nuclear-armed nation. Musharraf is under pressure at home and abroad to roll back the emergency powers he invoked on November 3. He has used them to purge the Supreme Court of judges he feared would annul his October 6 re-election by parliament. Having now secured a second five-year term, thanks to a new panel of friendly judges, he is expected to quit as army chief and take the oath as a civilian president in the coming days. Unpopular, politically isolated and desperate for support from the parliament that emerges from the January 8 poll, Musharraf now has to contend with two rivals he has spent much of the last eight years trying to marginalize and called corrupt. Musharraf allowed Benazir Bhutto, another two-time former prime minister, to come back to Pakistan last month protected from old graft charges in the hope she would become a post-election ally. But relations between the two quickly soured. Bhutto filed her nomination papers at Larkana, a family stronghold in the southern Sindh province on Monday ahead of the January 8 vote. Under Pakistani law candidates can stand for more than one seat. Bhutto had filed her nomination papers in Karachi on Sunday for a parliamentary seat reserved for women. Bhutto, along with supporters, came to the District Courts in Larkana to submit her nomination papers to the Returning Officer. Benazir Bhutto filled three nominatiotion papers separetly with the Returning Officer. Bhutto's nomination papers will be scrutinized on November 29. Hundreds of leaders and workers of Bhutto's party had thronged the court in Larkana. They held party flags and chanted pro-Bhutto slogans.

ITN Source | November 26, 2007

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