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Vote Loss Puts Heat On Musharraf

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By LAURA KING and HENRY CHU, Los Angeles Times

Published: February 20, 2008

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Calls mounted Tuesday for President Pervez Musharraf to step down after his ruling party suffered a resounding defeat in elections that independent monitors described as generally free and fair.

The door appeared open to the formation of a governing coalition that could allow the Pakistani leader to remain in office, but with his previously sweeping powers curtailed.

Musharraf's lieutenants conceded defeat Tuesday after unofficial results showed the two major opposition parties were top vote-getters in Monday's parliamentary elections.

Final results are expected today.

Between them, opposition parties connected with assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and another ex-prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, won about 60 percent of contested parliamentary seats, according to unofficial results. The pro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League-Q garnered a much smaller share.

Sharif, overthrown in a coup staged by Musharraf in 1999, cited the lopsided results as a mandate for the president to leave the political scene.

"The people have said what they want," said Sharif, 58. He extended an offer to form a coalition with the apparent biggest vote-getter, Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party.

It was unclear whether the PPP, led by Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, would demand Musharraf step aside or seek accommodation with him. The two opposition parties were to begin talks this week.
Election observers said despite complaints of irregularities, it appeared the vote was largely credible. Some analysts said the degree of anti-Musharraf sentiment, which swept many of his closest confidants from office, was simply too overwhelming for the government to manipulate the vote.

"I think the government was planning to rig, but the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the reaction to that forced a rethink," said Ahmed Bilal Mehboob, head of the nonprofit Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency. "Had there been a perception of rigging, it is very likely the result would have been violence the government was unable to control."

The chief of Musharraf's party said it would not contest the outcome. "We accept the results with an open heart," Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, who lost his parliamentary seat, told The Associated Press.

Musharraf was elected to a new five-year term as president by lawmakers late last year. But the new parliament could overturn his election or move to impeach him. Lawmakers could roll back some changes made by Musharraf during last year's six-week emergency rule, primarily his firing of dozens of judges.

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