LAHORE, Nov 16: Former PPP secretary-general Chaudhry Ahmad Mukhtar claims that President Pervez Musharraf wants to distance himself from the ruling PML and it is for this reason that at a recent meeting he had told the top leadership that he would hold absolutely free and fair elections without sharing with them the alternatives under his consideration.

Talking to Dawn here on Thursday, the PPP leader said the ruling party could not afford free and fair elections and the general’s resolve to hold open and honest polls clearly meant that the two might part company.

He pointed out that the president in his Wednesday night address to the nation had asked the voters to support ‘moderates’ in the next elections, and did not seek support for the ruling party as he had been doing in the past. In his opinion, the general now thought that the moderates could also belong to other parties.

A former minister for commerce, Ahmad Mukhtar said the president might have gauged the PML’s following among the masses and concluded that dependence on this party alone would mean doom. He said Gen Musharraf had to give breathing space to other parties as well to meet the challenges ahead.

Disputing the rhetoric that the government had made unprecedented achievements over the past few years, the PPP leader argued that had the claims been well-founded there would not have been any need for the rulers to say time and again that they would not allow former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif to come back to Pakistan and take part in the elections.

The PPP leader said Ms Bhutto, being a lady, would take all moderate forces along. “She understands and feels the pulse of the people of Pakistan and can run the country better than any banker or bureaucrat,” the PPP leader said in an obvious reference to the Shaukat Aziz rule.

Unlike bankers and bureaucrats, he said, politicians could always defy the rules of the IMF and the World Bank when their acceptance was not in the national interest.

Ahmad Mukhtar firmly believed that Gen Musharraf could not stop Ms Bhutto from returning to Pakistan. He claimed that the government could not arrest the former prime minister without registering new cases against her as she had already been allowed bail in the two cases already pending against her.

He said it had been decided after consultations that Ms Bhutto would return to Pakistan three months before the elections. If the PPP chairperson returned immediately, courts could put her on trial and sentence her before the polls. But if she came back a few months before the polls, courts would not be able to complete the trial in a short time because of which she would be able to take part in the elections despite cases against her.

Asked to comment on Shujaat Husain’s statement that the PML and the PPP could form a coalition after the next election, Ahmad Mukhtar said his political rival’s dream would never come true.

He claimed that the PML would be routed in a free and fair elections and the question of forming a coalition with the PPP would become irrelevant.

According to him, the PPP would defeat its rivals in Sindh with big margins. In the NWFP, he said, the PPP, the PML-N and the ANP would become an invincible force, and no party would be able to face them.

In southern Punjab, he said, the PPP would bag more than two-thirds of all seats. And in central Punjab, the ruling party would face a crushing defeat if the PPP and the PML-N joined hands.

In Balochistan, Ahmad Mukhtar said the contest would be between the ‘mullahs’ and other forces.

He said the future belonged to the PPP and it would form its government at the centre and in provinces.