Propelled by “people power”, opposition leader Nawaz Sharif scored a historic victory for the future of democracy in Pakistan early Monday by forcing his chief rival President Asif Ali Zardari to reinstate Iftikhar Chaudhry as chief justice and also end governor's rule in Punjab, officials said. “Chaudhry will be restored, and there will also be a constitutional package,” a government official with knowledge of the deal said. Other sources said a new government would be formed in Punjab by any party that proves its majority. Also the government would seek, from the new panel of judges in place, a review of the Supreme Court verdict last month that disqualified the Sharif brothers from holding elective office, the sources said. Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani was in contact with US special envoy Richard Holbrooke till nearly dawn Monday, the sources said. Army chief General Ashraf Kayani was also very much in the picture. “Sharif was in back-channel contact with both of them from his motorcade,” a source said. Gilani was to make a pre-recorded televised speech announcing the government's capitulation, but until dawn, no announcement came forth. Dawn TV reported that the speech was put off for later in the day due to “technical details” that needed to be sorted out. Sharif was at the house of the local district chief (Nazim) in Gujrawala, 130 km from Rawalpindi, waiting to watch Gilani's speech on TV. A helicopter waited nearby to fly him to Islamabad for a meeting Monday morning with the prime minister. Sharif's spokesman Ahsan Iqbal said at dawn Monday it was “a historic victory for democracy in Pakistan, a victory for the judiciary.” Celebrations erupted in Lahore and in front of Iftikhar Chaudhry's home in Islamabad as television channels reported the breakthrough. Zardari's retreat on the issue that threatened to explode into violent showdown between street agitators and government forces in Islamabad on Monday will raise inevitable question marks over his future. But for former prime minister Sharif, the victory at what he described as Pakistan's “defining moment” when he defied a three-day police detention order and joined thousands of his supporters on the streets of Lahore barely 24 hours earlier, will enhance his reputation as the “lion of Punjab.” Zardari's apparent capitulation capped a day of high drama for Pakistan and Sharif who was issued with a three-day police detention order at dawn as Zardari tried to stem the tide of popular resentment against him. For a moment there, as hundreds of policemen barricaded his house in Lahore, Sharif was stumped. But hundreds of his supporters broke through the police barricade and, in the ensuing melée, Sharif slipped out and joined the planned “long march” to Islamabad, risking his life without security cover by commandos, which the authorities had inexplicably withdrawn. “This is the defining moment,” Sharif told his supporters as he stepped into his bullet-proof car to join the convoy of vehicles that made its way past tens of thousands of chanting, flag-waving supporters for a downtown rally in front of the Lahore High Court. “I tell every Pakistani youth that this is not the time to stay home; Pakistan is calling you to come and save the country with me,” Sharif said. In Rawalpindi, Sharif's brother Shahbaz was also served the three-day detention order but he too managed to slip out and avoid arrest. Unable to restrict the Sharif brothers to their homes, the authorities then allowed Sharif to address the rally and return home afterward. But Sharif's spokesman Ahsan Iqbal told Saudi Gazette from Islamabad where he was in hiding to avoid arrest, that there would be no stopping the “long march” to Islamabad on Monday by opposition activists and lawyers. “It's a people's revolution,” he said. “The people of Pakistan have totally risen. They don't want to compromise on restoring the Nov. 2 judiciary. “President Zardari is in denial. He does not understand the popular mood.” Several thousands flag-waving demonstrators pushed past police barricades to reach the Lahore High Court. Protesters pelted some of the hundreds of riot police ringing the area with rocks, triggering running clashes. Others torched tires, sending plumes of black smoke into the blue sky. Police repeatedly fired tear gas, scattering the crowd, and beat several stragglers with batons, only for the demonstrators to return with fresh supplies of sticks and stones. Television images showed police commandos wearing flak jackets and armed with assault rifles apparently searching for Shahbaz in Rawalpindi, just south of the capital. Islamabad and other Pakistani cities were eerily quiet with most of the streets barricaded by huge cargo containers placed by the authorities to block the marchers. Moral high ground Observers feared that without security cover by commandos, Sharif could be assassinated, as had happened to Benazir Bhutto in 2007. Also, by holding firmly to what many saw as the moral high ground, Sharif could have found himself at odds with the United States, which has a history of interfering in Pakistan politics and favoring dictators, the observers said. But PML-N spokesman Iqbal dismissed such US adventurism in Pakistan this time around. “I think this new administration of President Barack Obama is showing a little change,” Iqbal told Saudi Gazette. “They are not blindly siding with Zardari like they used to with Musharraf – at the cost of the people. “We think they are not following the Bush policy. So far, they are showing openness and understanding of what the people of Pakistan are wanting. They are also trying to convince Zardari that he should show flexibility, because they know that popular sentiment is overwhelmingly running against him.” “I don't think that, now that there is democracy, the United States can afford to alienate such a strong popular opinion in Pakistan.” As it turned out, he seemed right.
