General must hold true to his promise

In the course of this week, perhaps within days, Pakistan's embattled President General Pervez Musharraf will hear a Supreme Court packed with his own nominees validating his election as president of his nation.

Will he follow this landmark judgement, however controversial, issued as it is under the Provisional Constitutional Order and an emergency, with a gesture to his countrymen that begins a rapprochement with the civil society that he has hopelessly alienated?

Will he lift the emergency, doff his uniform and hand over to a worthy successor as army chief? Will he release at least two high profile detainees - Asma Jehangir of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, and Aitzaz Ahsan, chairman of the Supreme Court Bar Association - as demanded by the UN?

Musharraf must follow this up by setting a date for elections after he dissolves the assemblies when their tenure expires on November 15.

Pakistanis will not expect polls within the mandatory 60 days, given that Muharram falls in January. But it is imperative that he holds true to his promise this time and announces elections "before February 2008".

And no later. As the country is needlessly polarised along pro- and anti-Musharraf lines and opposition leader Benazir Bhutto treads the path back towards the centre of the political game by reaching out to the media and the sacked chief justice, she is sending out a firm message that her own "deal" with Musharraf is over.

Where that will lead is open to question. But in these increasingly uncertain times, with Pakistan facing the challenge of a tribal insurrection along its western borders, it is crucial Musharraf moves swiftly to stabilise the political upheaval and the needless confrontation with the judiciary, the media and now Bhutto, when each one of them is a valuable ally in the war against terror.

Indeed, he must train his guns elsewhere.