Pakistan to select new president
Asif Ali Zardari, the head of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party, will likely take over the country’s presidency when legislators meet this weekend to select a successor to former president, Pervez Musharraf.
Mr Zardari, who is the widower of two-time prime minister Benazir Bhutto, will face off against two lightly regarded opponents when legislators meet tomorrow to choose a president to fill the gap created when former military strongman Mr Musharraf resigned under pressure last month.
People’s Party spokesman Farhatullah Babar said that it will be “an easy victory”.
The party is part of a coalition that swept to power in February parliamentary elections on a mostly anti-Musharraf platform, so no major changes in policy are expected.
The real question is whether the new leader will be any more successful than his predecessor in tackling extremism, economic malaise and a myriad of other ills plaguing a nuclear power on the front lines of the war on terrorism.
Mr Zardari, generally considered pro-West, also isn’t expected to change Pakistan’s commitment to be an ally in the US war on terrorism, despite a bold cross-border US-led raid on Wednesday that left at least 15 people dead in the country’s largely lawless tribal belt along the Afghan frontier. The raid sparked widespread condemnation of what was seen as an attack on the country’s sovereignty.
In news likely to stoke more anger, intelligence officials said a missile strike was suspected in a blast yesterday that killed at least four people in North Waziristan, part of the tribal belt where Osama bin Laden and his deputy are thought to be hiding. Previous similar strikes have been blamed on the US.
Mr Zardari criticised Wednesday’s raid, the first known foreign ground assault inside Pakistan against a suspected Taliban haven. But he also expressed sympathy for the US and other countries that have been hit by terrorist attacks, saying Pakistan also is suffering from extremist violence.
