YOUSAF Raza Gilani, a former parliament speaker and aide to murdered opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, was nominated yesterday as the parliamentary majority's choice to be Pakistan's next prime minister.
Gilani spent four years in jail on allegations he abused his authority as speaker during Bhutto's second term as prime minister in the 1990s. He was never convicted and was freed in 2005.
A spokesman for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, which ro
uted President Pervez Musharraf's allies in last month's elections, announced Gilani's nomination.
"Yousaf Raza Gilani is not afraid to lead and he knows the way," said PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar, reading a statement from Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari.
The naming of a premiership candidate was stalled for weeks, fuelling speculation that Zardari wanted the job himself. He now shares control of the party with their 19-year-old son. Zardari cannot become premier because he did not run for a parliamentary seat in the February 18 elections. But he could contest a by-election and win a seat to qualify as early as this summer. In that case, Gilani might be a stand-in.
Regardless, Gilani's nomination was a clear snub to PPP vice-chair Makhdoom Amin Fahim, long presumed the front-runner after leading Bhutto's party during her nearly eight years in exile. However, using an honorific title, he said: "I pray for the success of Makhdoom Yousaf Raza."
Fahim said he would not quit the party.
The battle for prime minister has strained party unity, even before it forms a coalition government that will face massive challenges, including a wave of Islamic militancy, high inflation and electricity shortages.
The administration will be led by the parties of Bhutto and another former premier, Nawaz Sharif, who was ousted in Musharraf's 1999 coup. A confrontation still looms between Musharraf and Sharif, one of the most vocal in calling for the unpopular president's resignation or impeachment.
A confirmation vote is scheduled for tomorrow in parliament and the prime minister is likely to be sworn in by Musharraf a day later. Gilani is likely to face an opposition candidate from Musharraf's Pakistan Muslim League-Q, after a disagreement between the two main pro-Musharraf parties about whether to field a candidate at all.
The Karachi-based Mutahida Qaumi Movement withdrew its candidate on Friday as a "goodwill gesture" to Bhutto's followers. But yesterday, Musharraf's party said it planned to field a candidate and would make an announcement today.
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, was appointed party chairman after his mother died, but his father is running things while he continues his studies at Oxford University. Bilawal flew to Pakistan on Wednesday to consult with party leaders.
Meanwhile, the leaders of the new coalition government say they will negotiate with the militants believed to be orchestrating the attacks and will use military force only as a last resort.
US officials fear it reflects a softening toward the militants just as Musharraf has given the Bush administration a freer hand to strike using pilotless Predator drones. Many Pakistanis, however, are convinced the surge in suicide bombings – 17 in the first 10 weeks of 2008 – is retaliation for three Predator strikes this year.
Zardari and Sharif have tried to strike a more independent stance from Washington. They said they were determined to set a different course from that of Musharraf, who has received generous military financial help of more than $10bn (£5.04bn) from Washington.
"We are dealing with our own people," said Sharif, who was twice prime minister in the 1990s."When you have a problem in your own family, you don't kill your own family; you sit and talk."
The war against the insurgents has to be redefined, Zardari said, as "Pakistan's war" for a public that has come to resent the conflict as being pushed on the country as part of a US agenda. It should be dealt with by talks and the use of a beefed-up police force rather than the army, he said.
Washington opposed past negotiations as it viewed short-term peace deals as a sign of weakness that resulted in the militants' winning time to fortify themselves.
The full article contains 698 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
