With Pervez Musharraf's legitimacy and support base crumbling, Pakistan's parties in the opposition plan a concerted attempt to restore democracy. A People's Movement is what's needed, nothing less.
In Pakistan's tryst with long periods of military rule, elected civilian governments have appeared as mere aberrations. None of the dictators were ousted due to popular pressure – General Yahya Khan replaced Field Marshal Ayub Khan; it was the humiliating defeat in Bangladesh that ended Yahya's tenure; and Zia Ul-Haq's death in a mysterious air crash paved the way for a democratic interlude. The supremacy of the Pakistan Army as an institution has largely gone unchallenged, and the politicians remain meek when dealing with the generals. The broad pattern of Pakistani politics will not change in the absence of a mass upsurge.
On 14 May, Benazir Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif agreed to launch a joint campaign to restore democracy in Pakistan. They signed the Charter of Democracy, labeled as a historic document that would change the complexion of the state. The document promises to subordinate the military to civilian control, vest executive authority in the prime minister, and ensure independence of the judiciary. The two leaders also demanded that the 1973 Constitution be restored, and free and fair elections conducted under a national government.
Sharif had once expressed his fascination for the democratic culture in India, where political differences do not usually translate into personal animosity, and contrasted it to the situation in Pakistan. Indeed, Bhutto and Sharif were not on talking terms through the 1990s, and each spared no effort to use the state machinery to target the other while in power. Both have been accused of significant corruption: Bhutto looked the other way for her husband, who spent eight years in jail; Sharif, meanwhile, was sent into exile in lieu of serving extensive prison time for tax evasion and 'terrorism and hijacking'. It is this bitter past that makes the agreement between the two leaders, out of sheer necessity if not ideological commitment, a significant event. It is this unity that promises to give a fresh lease of life to the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD), which has been struggling to mobilise people against the Musharraf regime for more than five years. The ARD, which is comprised of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz), along with other smaller outfits, is expected to ratify the Charter in early July.