Nawaz Sharif's second coming

Pakistan's former prime minister Nawaz Sharif makes another attempt at a homecoming today that will not be a repeat of September 10, when after a long, overnight flight from London, he was hustled into a waiting plane and ignominiously packed off to Saudi Arabia. What will be different this time?

For one thing, the flight from Madinah to Lahore has the blessing of Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz, who prudently kept his counsel while angry Pakistanis railed against the manner of Sharif's deportation.

Instead, he seems to have quietly ensured that Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf keeps to his word and allows Sharif to return after November 15.

There will be no aircraft taxiing on the runway, preparing to fly back to Jeddah with a VVIP passenger. There will be no monarch acquiescing to fears that Sharif's return will destabilise the country, when it was clear after non-existent protests over the deportation that street agitations in the Punjab owe their provenance to the Islamist parties; and that even when the Pakistani street erupted when another former opposition leader Benazir Bhutto ended her eight-year exile, the bombs were meant to frighten, not kill the star player.

No show

There will be no Chaudhry Shujaat gloating over events. Indeed, the no show for Sharif and the house full for Bhutto (and for that matter, the sacked chief justice) in Pakistan's rough and tumble political theatre helped reinforce the Saudi message to Musharraf that they were not prepared to countenance one rule for one Pakistani politician and one rule for another.

But while questions remain over whether Sharif is for a boycott or is returning to act as paterfamilias, as his wife and brother unfurl the standard in his name, his relationship with Bhutto will be critical.

Until the announcement of his return, the boycott was a threat, not just by him, but all the other anti-Musharraf parties including Imran Khan, recently released from gaol.

That all of these without exception have chosen to publicly back a boycott while filing nominations is a salutary lesson that doublespeak is alive and well not just in president's house but in every other political formation.

What lies ahead? Sharif and Bhutto have not been able to agree on a common battle plan. In a reprise of the Bhutto boycott earlier this year when Sharif convened an all party conference and downgraded the All Parties Conference chairman Makhdoom Ameen Fahim from chairman of the APC to a mere delegate at the newly named All Parties Democratic Movement, the Pakistan Peoples Party has resisted every attempt at being seen as the junior partner in any putative opposition alliance.

Sharif's move may spring from ignorance or even be deliberate. Either way, as they spar for supremacy, the only commonality they share is their anti-Musharraf status.

Tactically muted

In the case of Bhutto that too has been tactically muted as she walks the fine line between sticking to Washington's script and her own convictions as a moderate committed to staunching the Islamist tide while remaining hesitant to tap the anti-military feelings that run high both within her own party and among the common people and the elite, the media, lawyers and students, undaunted by the emergency.

Sharif has his own dilemmas. He has come to the belated realisation that key elements of his APDM, the duplicitous Maulana Fazlur Rahman and Qazi Hussain Ahmad's Jamaat, which arrested and handed over ally Imran Khan to the authorities, have made a mockery of his alliance.

Not only do they all differ radically on whether to participate in the January 8 elections or not, Sharif knows their backing wins less than 10 per cent of the vote at best.

Despite polls that place him ahead of every other contender, when ranged against the establishment, his PML stands little chance even in its own backyard in the Punjab.

Clearly, unless the Bhutto and Sharif streams come together to fight elections, rigged or otherwise, they will see a repeat of 2002, when both parties were bled from within by the establishment.

Difficult

Unless they join forces, mounting a strong enough protest against rigged elections can also become difficult. Musharraf, angered by the Commonwealth suspension - what role did India play? - has safeguarded his own position with amendments to the constitution that make the emergency and judicial activism irrelevant.

As he hands over the army chief's baton to a successor, only Bhutto and Sharif coming together can pressure the general for a free and fair election.

Or risk continuing irrelevance in an unchanging status quo. Sharif's second coming must open a new chapter in opposition unity.

Neena Gopal is an analyst on Asia.