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Rigged polls
Sharif predicts backlash
Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif has accused President Pervez Musharraf of planning to rig next week's elections, describing it as a move that could trigger uncontrollable unrest and tear the country apart.
Sharif also said in an interview that US support for Musharraf was deepening anti-American sentiment in the country.
"We stand for democracy. He stands for dictatorship," Sharif said as he travelled in his armour-plated SUV to a raucous campaign rally attended by about 7,000 supporters in the northern town of Kahuta, a hub of the country's nuclear programme. "In order to survive, he has to rig the election. He knows that," he said.
Musharraf maintains that he wants to oversee a transfer to full democracy. However, a convincing opposition win could leave him vulnerable to impeachment.
Sharif accused the government of buying votes and readying 1.8 million postal ballots to be cast in favour of the Pakistan Muslim League-Q party - allegations denied by officials - and warned that if the ruling party won, it would lead to "uncontrollable" unrest.
- AP
Islamabad (Reuters) The country goes to vote on Monday in an election that could bring about the downfall of President Pervez Musharraf if it returns a hostile parliament with a prime minister who wants to be his own man.
While it's not a presidential election there's no doubting what the main issue is.
"It is President Pervez Musharraf," said Ijaz Shafi Gilani, chairman of Gallup Pakistan, whose survey released yesterday showed almost two-thirds of all voters had had enough of the 64-year-old ex-commando leading their nuclear-armed country.
US ally Musharraf is used to prime ministers doing his bidding since he came to power as a general in a coup in 1999.
He got himself re-elected while still army chief by a pliant parliament before it was dissolved, and then in November invoked emergency powers for six weeks to remove judges who might have ruled it unconstitutional.
The next prime minister has to choose whether to play second fiddle to him and the parliament cannot duck the issue of the constitutionality of Musharraf's presidency, Gilani said. An expected low turnout and possible rigging could help Musharraf ride out the storm but if any rigging is overdone, it would risk sparking agitation that could precipitate his end.
If the vote isn't rejected, everything hinges on what the party of assassinated opposition leader Benazir Bhutto opts to do if, as expected, it emerges as the largest party in 342-seat National Assembly and gets a chance to lead the next coalition.
Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples' Party (PPP), now led by her widower Asif Ali Zardari must choose between negotiating a working arrangement with Musharraf, or confrontation, which is what most PPP voters want to see, according to Gilani.
Not a priority
Najam Sethi, editor of the Daily Times and a top political analyst, believed the PPP won't make Musharraf's ouster its priority.
"I don't think they would risk getting into another fight so soon after coming to power unless, of course, Musharraf makes life very difficult for them," Sethi said. "If they're pushed to the wall they will, but as a first option, I don't think so."
Musharraf's survival will be unpopular with people fed up with rising food prices and the human cost of a war against Islamist militants that many think is America's, not Pakistan's.
People are angry over Musharraf's authoritarian responses to challenges over the past year.
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