By DPA
Islamabad : Pakistani liberal opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, after being released from house arrest Friday, rejected the caretaker government appointed by President Pervez Musharraf to hold general elections in January.
“We do not accept this government. It has committed treason by taking oath under Provincial Constitutional Order (PCO),” she told reporters hours after she was freed from three days of house arrest in Lahore.
“We demand that Musharraf take off his uniform. We want to see a neutral caretaker government which is acceptable for all opposition parties,” Bhutto said, adding that only such a government could ensure fair elections.
The PCO is the decree through which Musharraf, an army general who took power in a 1999 coup, imposed the state of emergency, suspending the constitution and taking several news channels off the air.
Following the dissolution of the lower house of parliament at the end of its five-year term late Thursday, Musharraf Friday swore in a new cabinet headed by the chairman of the upper house, Mohammedmian Soomro.
Regarded as a loyal supporter of the military ruler, Soomro will oversee scheduled polls that Musharraf says will be held in the first week of January.
The opposition is unappeased by the move and demands the general should quit both as president and as head of the armed forces.