President Asif Ali Zardari sees no judicial crisis except a few deposed judges issuing political statements, and offers them to join politics. “I see no judicial crisis or anything of the sort,” he said in an interview with the English daily The News. He advised the deposed judges, whom he counted as only four including the “big gun,” not to throw a political challenge to the government. “The way these ‘former' judges are delivering speeches similar to that of politicians, I would advise the prime minister to give them tickets for the Senate election to be held next year,” the president said. He said forty-two out of 62 judges have taken new oath afresh and now it's a problem of only four or five people as many of them have already retired. When asked whether these judges also included deposed Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, he said in a lighter tone that Chaudhry was so popular that he might pose a threat to the government, as they had assumed the role of politicians and “we would invite them to join politics and contest the Senate elections.” Zardari said he, as president, has the power to lift the two-year ban before any judge or government servant contests polls. He recounted his major achievements during his first 45 days in office as uniting the federation, undertaking a remarkably important official tour to China and taking on board the people of Pakistan and Awami National Party (ANP) on the war on terror. About creating the constitutional office of vice president of Pakistan similar to the American system, Zardari said the issue along with constitutional package would be presented to parliament by early next year. “The prime minister or the ruling party along with its allies would take decisions on such matters. But we have to look into what responsibilities and duties the vice president, if it happens to be, will have or whether he would be a ceremonial kind of vice president.” On taking unpopular decisions and overcoming the power crisis, Zardari said Pakistan might be going for new technology-based power plants. He, however, said the first step the government would take to save energy would be to replace more than 10 million bulbs with free-of-cost energy savers with lower voltage and more light. “The protests against high tariff rates are urban-based and we have to take unpopular decisions,” said Zardari, who invited all and sundry with financial and economic expertise to help the nation by providing it input. “That was the reason we had made Ishaq Dar, a PML-N MP as finance minister, but he the government. But we still invite him to be a part of a parliamentary committee dealing with economic and energy matters and his input would be welcome.” The president brushed aside any possibility of mid-term polls, adding democracy will progress in the spirit of Charter of Democracy. To a question about Nawaz Sharif's statement regarding mid-term polls, Zardari said he does not see any such chance. “Mid-term or general elections after 5 years would be held under the supervision of the president. However, the decision to hold polls would be taken by the prime minister.” “There is not even the remotest chance of mid-term polls,” he declared. “The Sharif brothers are my friends and we have signed Charter of Democracy and it would remain intact for giving strength to democracy.” He referred many things to the prime minister in the sense that he was the chief executive of the country. “The tank-commander (referring to Musharraf as a gunner) assumed the powers of chief executive and then the president and he left behind nothing but a mess. Similarly, Shaukat Aziz, who knows market economy or service industry plunged the country in an economic mess,” he said. Zardari said the IMF is not for filling in a begging bowl but an institution to correct a wrong. “What to talk about Pakistan, Sweden has also recently approached the IMF to save its economy and keep its financial health as robust as possible. When per barrel cost of oil shoots up to $147, it would generally hit us.” The president said global economic crisis would not hit Pakistan hard as our economy was not exposed so much. He said the government and various think tanks are evolving a new strategy to effectively deal with the looming crisis and the prime minister is doing his best to keep the effect of global economic crisis away from Pakistan. He said his Chinese visit, first official tour to a foreign country as president, was highly successful. Zardari said all the regional players are engaged or being engaged in talks including Afghanistan and India. “I have met Manmohan Singh once and the prime minister met him twice in the recent past and our focus of talks was the water issue, as Pakistan is concerned about water.” The president said the new American president would herald a new international political environment with new challenges and Pakistan has to play its role in such an environment. He said the in-camera parliament session has led all to evolve a consensus on national security strategy and its outcome would be far-reaching. He said the Balochistan issue would also be debated in parliament. __
