ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan’s long-troubled ruling coalition collapsed Monday amid arguments over who should be president and whether and how to reinstate dozens of senior judges fired last year.
The disintegration of the coalition, anticipated for some time, does not necessarily mean the government will collapse — at least not immediately. The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), which has the most parliamentary seats, probably can cobble together an alliance.
Problems remain
Still, the coalition’s downfall bodes ill for government efforts to confront an economy in near-meltdown and an Islamic insurgency that has grown in strength and audacity.
While the coalition was falling, the government made a symbolic effort to contain some militants who have been carrying out larger and bolder attacks. Rehman Malik, the top civilian law-enforcement official, announced a ban on Pakistan’s Taliban movement, Tehrik-e-Taliban, led by militant commander Baitullah Mahsud.
The move is likely to have little practical effect. It means the group cannot legally conduct fundraising, but virtually all its money is thought to flow through illegal channels and various front groups.
Still, the ban marks a change in the government’s stance. It previously had tried to negotiate peace deals with Mahsud, even though he is blamed for orchestrating scores of suicide bombings and other attacks, including the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, which he denies.
Malik, the interior minister, declared that government forces would continue to attack militant sanctuaries in the Bajur tribal agency, near the Afghan border, where fighting has forced hundreds of thousands of civilians to flee. In another trouble spot, the Swat Valley in northwest Pakistan, insurgents killed at least eight people Monday when they fired a rocket into a lawmaker’s home.
The new disarray within the government came just a week after President Pervez Musharraf stepped down under threat of impeachment.
Without the common cause of driving him from power, the PPP and former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N found little ground for unity.
Sharif announced the walkout after the PPP, led by Bhutto’s widower, Asif Ali Zardari, refused to meet a Monday deadline to seal a deal on reinstatement of judges fired by Musharraf in November during a state of emergency.
Vowing no “overthrow”
“Repeated defaults and violations have forced us to withdraw our support from the ruling coalition,” Sharif said at a news conference in the capital.
Zardari had agreed in principle to restore the judiciary, including fired Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry. But Zardari is thought to fear the revival of corruption charges against him if the judges return to the bench.
Sharif said his party, the second-biggest vote-getter in February elections, would sit in opposition, but he insisted that he was not trying to stage an “overthrow” of the government. However, the former prime minister and his party have been gaining popular support for their fierce defense of the fired jurists, and many analysts believe that if another general election were held now, they would win easily.
