Zardari Stuns - Disturbing signs

PPP co-chairman stuns allies
Saturday April 05, 2008 (1201 PST)
More:Pak Tribune


Zardari issues ‘charge-sheet’
Snubs Aitzaz; says he is not interested in restoration of personalities
By Ansar Abbasi
The News Sunday, April 06, 2008, Rabi-ul-Awal 28, 1429 A.H.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari has issued a long charge-sheet against the deposed superior court judges, saying they never came to his rescue and were responsible for his eight years in jail.
In the clearest indication that the PPP may not stand by the Murree Declaration to restore the judges, the PPP leader told his central executive committee in Naudero that he was not interested in the restoration of personalities but wanted a judicial reforms package.
More:The News

Disturbing signs
Saturday, April 05, 2008
The issue of restoration of the deposed judges is already causing cracks and friction not only in the grand political coalition but within the ranks of the PPP as well. Barrister Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan has even gone on record to unfold what he calls a constitutional package, born and bred in the presidency, to selectively screen out the judges not liked by the presidency, foremost among them Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry. Under the attractive garb of providing sovereignty to parliament, Aitzaz says, all judges would be dismissed and then re-appointed after scrutiny by a parliamentary committee where the pro-presidency elements would rake up dirt against the unwanted judges and eliminate them. On Thursday this warning by Aitzaz was almost confirmed by PPP co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari at the PPP CEC meeting at Naudero, when he said the restoration of the judges would be linked to the judiciary reforms package, a position different from the Bhurban Accord. There are also reports that Mr Zardari publicly snubbed and rebuked Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan in Naudero on the judges issue, asking him to stop threatening long marches and stop claiming the credit for the restoration of democracy because, according to Mr Zardari, it was Benazir Bhutto's ultimate sacrifice and not the lawyers' movement or judges' sacking which led to the elections and the return to democracy. These signs of bitterness within the PPP are unfortunate, but the main coalition partner of the PPP, the PML-N, is also not going to like the way things are moving and an urgent session of the party was held on Friday to discuss the developments.
More:The News