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‘Pakistan cannot have a non-democratic president’

* Asif Zardari says no point in working hard and asking Pakistani people to make sacrifices if government will be sent home in two years
* Says Pakistan and India linked by ancient civilisations

Daily Times Monitor

LAHORE: Pakistan cannot have “an un-elected and non-democratic president” and the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) is working to put together a “liveable formula” for a “full-fledged democracy in Pakistan”, PPP Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari said in an interview with the Press Trust of India on Thursday.

“After all that has happened, you cannot have an un-elected and non-democratic President,” he said. “You just cannot. Now no matter whether I like it or don’t like it, or whether [President Pervez Musharraf] likes it or anybody else doesn’t like it, I have no choice.”

Zardari said he was “the servant of the people, not the master of the people”.

Asked if Musharraf's days as president are numbered, Zardari replied: “I don’t know whether his days are numbered or my days are numbered or our government’s days are numbered. Who knows that?

“He still has 58(2b) and he has a tremendous amount of power behind him. If he moves, he moves,” he said. Zardari said he had not seen the constitutional package being prepared by Law Minister Farooq Naek but indicated that it would curb the president’s sweeping powers and address “core issues” like Article 58 (2b) and the need for an autonomous Election Commission.

No point: “There’s no point in me working hard, giving my life, fighting terrorism, asking the parliament and the Pakistani people to make sacrifices if you’re going to be sent home in two years,” he said.

“It’s a very complex issue after all. You’re talking about the future of Pakistan, the future of democracy and about the future of the constitution. So lots of ifs and buts have to be counted,” he said.

Zardari said that he considered Musharraf's acts during the emergency as illegal. “Instead of going for a police action to restore the judges as is being suggested, I’d rather take another path towards democracy and engage the present incumbent President [and say], ‘That fine, let’s talk shop and give me back all the rights that you hold against the parliament’ and that also by dialogue.

Zardari said India should reduce the army’s deployment in Jammu and Kashmir and compensated by India through the posting of a larger police force which would be “more humane” and help in addressing the “60-year-old wound” of the Kashmir issue.

“The army by design, wherever it is, by its nature is crude – whether it is your army or any other army,” Zardari said, adding that army presence in Kashmir was “increasing the divide rather than patching it up”.

“If you had a police force there, even if it was 500,000-strong, police training is different and they have to go back to their wives. They don’t have to go back to their cantonments and they live in the normal world,” Zardari said.

Ancient civilisations: Regarding economic co-operation, he said, “My dream is that Pakistan is the force multiplier for India. We had one country, one nation,” he said, adding the subcontinent was linked by ancient civilisations that ranged from the Indus valley in Pakistan to Assam in India.

“You can’t expand Kolkata port. With today's technology, I can make 20 deep sea ports and an economic zone in Gwadar. I can have high speed cargo trains, have a 17 or 18 hour turnaround period from your railway lines and the products will be available to you.

“You cannot put up gas containers on Mumbai beach but I can put up (on the Pakistani coastline) any number of gas containers (and acquire gas from) all sorts of friendly Muslim countries where I, the PPP and the Government of Pakistan have influence. And we dovetail it, we create economic zones owned by the people.”

He said his party and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz wanted to do away with visa restrictions for India to boost ties.

Asked if he expected progress on such issues when the two countries have been unable to resolve a host of trade-related issues, he said: “Talk to me next year, either I am here in power and we’ll talk about the progress that I’ve made or I won’t be here – one of the two.”

The PPP co-chairman said he had asked the India Foreign minister to help Pakistan send a request to the UN for a probe in Benazir Bhutto’s assassination. “So hopefully, in her death, [Benazir] will bring us together on a resolution which will be [historic],” he said. Asked about Mukherjee's response to his request, Zardari said, “I haven’t had official confirmation but he was sympathetic to my position.”

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