Resignation shows Musharraf's hold

By Zaffar Abbas BBC correspondent in Islamabad

Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali was not a political heavyweight whose exit from Pakistan's political scene will be missed by anyone.

In fact, he had been such a non-entity within the governing Pakistan Muslim League (PML) party that when he announced his decision to resign at the party's parliamentary caucus, not a single MP tried to stop him from doing so.

On the contrary, the ruling party lawmakers were keener to find out who his successor was going to be - and there was loud applause when the PML President, Chaudry Shujat Hussain, was nominated.

Jamali was increasingly reluctant to bow to pressure

Although the move is not in violation of the constitution, it has raised fresh questions about the state of democracy in the country.

And the way this change has been engineered somehow suggests that Pakistan's is still a "controlled democracy" where decisions are imposed from the top, mostly by the president who also happens to the chief of the army.

Mr Jamali was not a very charismatic or competent prime minister, but then he was never meant to be.

He was chosen by President Pervez Musharraf, who at the time was perhaps looking for a prime minister who would not stand in the way of his policy objectives.

Making a stand

After seizing power in a military coup in October 1999, President Musharraf eventually fulfilled a pledge to hold parliamentary elections three years later.

But at the same time he introduced his own new political model that allowed him to hold the dual office of the president and the army chief, and to set up a National Security Council in order to institutionalise the role of the armed forces in the civilian set-up.

Initially Mr Jamali obliged both President Musharraf and the PML chief, Mr Hussain. However, there came a time when he, too, tried to assert himself.

Musharraf refused to allow Jamali to encroach on his power

Mr Jamali reportedly took a position on some of the issues like the creation of the National Security Council, which sent alarm bells ringing in the president's camp.

At one point he even suggested that he expected Mr Musharraf to honour his pledge by removing his military uniform. There were also reports that at times he refused to oblige the party's president on issues that he considered unethical or illegal.

But the first real sign of an emerging crisis became known earlier this year when during a foreign visit Mr Jamali issued a statement highlighting the fact that no previous Pakistani government had been allowed to complete its tenure.

It was certainly not a naive statement, and was followed by Mr Jamali expressing the hope that he would be able to see out his term in office.

Undermined

It certainly did not go down well with the president's camp. Since the ruling party's leader had already turned against him, a vicious campaign soon started against Mr Jamali.

Stories were regularly leaked in the newspapers about his possible ousting and pressure kept building on him through party colleagues and the press, eventually compelling him to quit.

The move was followed by a shocking announcement that instead of a more energetic party figure, the ailing PML president was going to be the new prime minister.

Jamali is succeeded temporarily by Hussain

But a bigger surprise came within hours, when it was disclosed that Mr Hussain's appointment was only a stop-gap arrangement, and that within six months the present finance minister, Shaukat Aziz, would take over as prime minister.

During this period he will have to fulfil the constitutional requirement of getting elected to parliament's lower house, the National Assembly.

The former international banker is part of President Musharraf's original team. He is also a known favourite of the US, and is credited with turning around Pakistan's economy in a big way.

The decision also indicates that President Musharraf will continue to remain the country's de facto chief executive, and hence his domestic and regional policies will not be affected.

Opinion remains divided on whether the ousting of Mr Jamali, or the way he has been forced to quit, undermines democracy.

However, it certainly shows that Pakistan's powerful military, or at least the present military ruler, prefers to rule through technocrats, with parliament being treated as nothing more than a necessary evil.