By DPA
Islamabad : Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto Wednesday said she did not trust President Pervez Musharraf and demanded that he end emergency rule, step down as army chief and ensure that parliamentary elections are held as scheduled.
Bhutto, who has been in power-sharing talks with Musharraf for several months, said here that police had begun rounding up hundreds of members of her liberal Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).
She also called upon the entire opposition to protest in the twin city of Rawalpindi on Friday at his recent actions, saying that Pakistani citizens should “stand up with courage to protect their rights.”
“Our objective in holding negotiations with the Musharraf government was that we wanted to restore democracy in a peaceful manner through free and fair elections,” Bhutto told a press briefing.
“But since Musharraf has imposed emergency we no longer think we can trust him any more … Instead of finding ourselves in a democratic order we found ourselves back in a dictatorship again,” she added.
Bhutto also called for the restoration of electronic media blocked by the authorities since the emergency was declared on Saturday, and the release of thousands of lawyers, political activists and judges who were arrested.
Musharraf justified the emergency measures by citing the rise in militant violence in the country and an unruly judiciary, many members of which were subsequently sacked and detained.
Bhutto criticised the government’s failure to curb the spread of militancy amid the current instability with a dire warning: “If Pakistan implodes, it’s a nuclear-armed country, this will have far-reaching ramifications.”
The PPP reiterated its demand that independent foreign experts be called in to investigate the suicide bombings aimed at Bhutto when she arrived in the southern port city of Karachi last month after eight years in self-exile abroad.
Around 140 people died and some 500 were injured in the attack, which Bhutto blamed on members of the political establishment.
Under pressure by the opposition and his political backers in the United States and Britain, Musharraf – an army general who came to power in a 1999 coup and became America’s key ally in the war on terror – had previously pledged to shed his uniform and serve as a civilian leader.
But facing the possibility that the Supreme Court could overturn his Oct 6 re-election, Musharraf Saturday partially suspended the constitution and introduced measures tantamount to martial law.