LONDON, Oct 4: A visibly confident Benazir Bhutto told a crowded press conference here on Thursday that she expected the proposed national reconciliation ordinance to be promulgated later in the evening to satisfy most of her party’s vital concerns and therefore, she said the PPP had decided not to resign from the assemblies before the presidential elections due on October 6.

She implied that the year-long talks between her party and the military-led govern-

ment of President Pervez Musharraf for a peaceful transition from military dictatorship to civilian democracy had finally culminated in a power-sharing ‘deal’ between the two.

She disagreed with a suggestion that she would be violating the spirit of democracy by participating in the election of a uniformed general.

She said her party could still boycott the elections without resigning and it could also vote for its candidate Makhdoom Amin Fahim and in her opinion none of these actions amounted to according legitimacy to the election of an in-service general.

When a foreign correspondent asked if she thought it was legitimate for a serving Chief of Army Staff to contest elections, Ms Bhutto said the issue was being considered by the courts and she would like to go by their verdict.

She said that all contentious issues, including the matter of indemnity, delaying an understanding with the government had been sorted out and that she expected the verbal accord reached on Wednesday night between her team consisting PPP president Makhdoom Amin Fahim and Rehman Malik and government negotiators would be given legal cover through the proposed National Reconciliation Ordinance. She clarified that the indemnity would apply across the board to all the governments that ruled the country between 1988 and October 12, 1999, including the governments of Nawaz Sharif.

She did not spell it out in so many words but an understanding seems to have also been reached between her and President Musharraf on her demand that the bar on her and Nawaz to contest for the post of prime minister for the third time be lifted and a balance be introduced in the powers between the president and the prime minister by withdrawing the Article 58(2)b.

On the issue of presidential powers she said this matter would come up for discussion when after the general elections a civilian Musharraf would be seeking a vote of confidence from parliament

During the press conference she kept on insisting that until and unless the ordinance was not promulgated she would continue to keep her fingers crossed as, according to her, there were many a slip between the cup and the lip.

She did not disagree with a questioner who said something to the effect that it was actually a US-sponsored national reconciliation effort, but insisted that if it had not been for the people of Pakistan who supported her in the country at the grass roots through all these years and through the thick and thin, no amount of US facilitation would have helped her to remove the hurdles in the way of her return to Pakistan and lead her party in the general elections hopefully on a level-playing field.

“Those very people who did not want even to talk to me want me back in the country today and join them in forming a moderate coalition against extremism, militancy and terrorism, and Musharraf has also agreed to doff the uniform after election,” she added.

When asked what had happened between Thursday and Wednesday night when she gave the impression that the talks had stalled, she said General Musharraf had said he wanted national reconciliation. “We want it too. We believe the nation should leave the past behind and look towards a better future.”

Explaining the indemnity clause in the proposed ordinance, she said that after the next election no case would be constituted against a member of parliament without referring the matter to a parliamentary committee and getting its approval.

In this connection, she mentioned the recent case of Chief Justice and said that a number of unfounded charges were framed after he had been dismissed unlawfully.

When asked about her reported insistence that all her cases be withdrawn, she said the PPP was a democratic party, it would never bargain for individuals. “We have asked for withdrawal of cases against all political workers. Even in the case of Asif Zardari we did not compromise, he was released by the courts when they had no evidence against him in any case.”

The press conference was held soon after the completion of deliberations by the PPP CWC meeting which had been called to consider the proposed national reconciliation draft ordinance.

During the press conference, the PPP chairperson was sitting flanked by information secretary Sherry Rehman and Punjab PPP president Shah Mehmood Qureshi. Ms Rehman appeared to be trying hard to avoid eye contact with her friends in the media and the face of Shah Mehmood Qureshi made some people recall the photograph of General Ayub Khan signing the Tashkent Declaration with a glum and visibly gloomy Z.A. Bhutto, then Pakistan’s foreign minister sitting on his right.

The joke that kept circulating among the media persons as the press conference was kept being delayed inordinately was that the accord had been held up because of just one point: Under no circumstances the government was prepared to include the name of Rehman Malik, the policeman-turned-tycoon in the list of those government officials granted indemnity under the ordinance and Ms Bhutto insisting that she would not sign the accord unless her security chief and one of the negotiators was also given the concession.