Pakistan prepares for major confrontation

By M Ilyas Khan
BBC News, Karachi

Nawaz Sharif's planned procession could be explosive

With crucial elections just around the corner, Pakistan is gripped with an air of expectancy following the return of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to the country on Monday, ending a seven-year-long exile.

The grapevine is abuzz and various questions are being raised.

Will he give a final shove to the country's already beleaguered military ruler, President Pervez Musharraf, who ousted him in a military coup in October 1999?

Will the government jail him, or deport him to Saudi Arabia?

According to his detractors, he found arrest and imprisonment so inconvenient in December 2000 that he agreed to go into exile instead.

For most observers, the scene is as murky as it is exciting, and all predictions are risky.

Multiple onslaught

Nawaz Sharif is not reputed to be the most outstanding talent among the leaders of his PML(N) party, but he has been prime minister twice, which makes him a political heavyweight.

And he is returning to face a ruler whose grip on the country has been slipping due to growing public unrest and an increasingly independent judiciary.

Gen Musharraf's attempt to sack the chief justice of the country in March sparked a nation-wide protest campaign by lawyers, civil society groups and the opposition parties, putting the government on the defensive.

MUSHARRAF UNDER PRESSURE 9 March: Musharraf suspends chief justice for "abuse of power". Lawyers protest April: Protests grow, amid clashes with police 12 May: 34 people die as rival political groups clash in Karachi 11 July: 102 people die when army storms radical Red Mosque in Islamabad July-Aug: Sharp rise in suicide attacks by pro-Taleban militants 20 July: Supreme Court reinstates chief justice 9 Aug: Musharraf rejects emergency rule 23 Aug: Supreme Court says exiled ex-PM Nawaz Sharif can return How 1999 coup unfolded Profile: Nawaz Sharif Q&A: Political crisis

The president's moral standing suffered when the Supreme Court, in a popular move, reinstated the chief justice in July.

Last month, the court upheld a petition by Mr Sharif seeking his return to the country.

And lawyers have also kick-started what they call the "second phase" of their movement, aimed at preventing Gen Musharraf from running for another presidential term.

The PML(N) itself has indicated that it plans a big reception for Mr Sharif in Islamabad, the country's capital, where he will land, and all along the 280-km route to his native Lahore city where he will travel in a land procession.

Opposition parties in the newly formed APDM alliance have expressed full support for these plans.

Can Gen Musharraf withstand this multiple onslaught?

Deal threatened

For Gen Musharraf, these troubles come just over two months before his term as president expires.

His term as the army chief technically expired in August 2003 when he reached retirement age, but a special act of parliament allowed him to carry on as both president and army chief until 15 October 2007.

He has been exploring different options to retain both offices for another term, but none of them are likely to stand up in a court of law.

Another parliamentary exemption may help, and it has been offered to him by the PPP, the largest party in the country. But it wants him to give up his army post and settle for reduced presidential powers.

This deal may be threatened if Nawaz Sharif whips up considerable mass support for his anti-Musharraf campaign, tempting the PPP to drop what most analysts view as unpopular negotiations with the government.

Sharif's supporters in Pakistan are already celebrating

The government appears to have adopted a two-pronged strategy to meet the situation.

First, hundreds of PML(N) workers and leaders have been arrested in Punjab province to prevent them from mobilising support for Mr Sharif's reception.

Second, government officials are sending out veiled threats that he may be arrested at Islamabad airport.

Last month, the government requested the courts to re-open cases of corruption against Mr Sharif and his family, but legal experts believe he can get bail in those cases.

Top government lawyers have also indicated that a presidential pardon granted to him in two criminal convictions in 2000 may be revoked.

Opinion differs on whether such a remission can be withdrawn, but the government may be able to hold him in jail for the time it takes for the court to settle the issue.

And if the verdict favours the government, his hopes of freedom may vanish for as long as Gen Musharraf remains in power.

In addition, government lawyers say he can be prevented from contesting the parliamentary elections under a law that bars a convict from holding a public office.

Unpopular move

So, is it really worth Mr Sharif's while to return to Pakistan?

The bookies in the country have been offering stakes of 1:10 against Mr Sharif making a comeback.

They say he could be deported to Saudi Arabia, which mediated his exile deal with the government in 2000.

After the coup of 1999, he was jailed for a year before his life sentence was commuted to exile in Saudi Arabia, apparently at his own request.

It was an unpopular move and many believed that Mr Sharif, having little political training or conviction, had cracked when confronted with the hardships of life in jail.

But observers say he knows enough politics to have understood that his failure to return would have put an end to his career - while his arrest and incarceration may turn him into a hero.