ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN — Calls mounted Tuesday for President Pervez Musharraf to step down after his ruling party suffered a resounding defeat in elections that independent monitors described as having been generally free and fair.
But the door also appeared open to the formation of a governing coalition that could allow the Pakistani leader to remain in office, though with his previously sweeping powers curtailed.
Musharraf's lieutenants conceded defeat Tuesday after unofficial results showed that the two major opposition parties had been the top vote-getters in Monday's parliamentary elections.
Final results were expected today.
Between them, opposition parties tied to assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and another ex-prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, won about 60% of contested parliamentary seats whose votes had been counted, according to unofficial results. The pro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League-Q garnered a much smaller share than either of its top rivals.
Sharif, who was overthrown in a coup staged by Musharraf in 1999 and has demanded his removal, cited the lopsided results as a popular mandate for the president, a former army general and a key U.S. ally, to leave the political scene altogether.
"The people have said what they want," said Sharif, 58. He extended an offer to form a coalition with the apparent biggest vote-getter, Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party, or PPP.
But it was not yet clear whether the PPP, now led by Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, would demand that the president step aside or seek an accommodation with him. The two opposition parties were to embark on talks this week.
Zardari told journalists in Islamabad, the capital, that for the time being his party does not want to ally itself with "any of those people who are part and parcel of the last government." But he did not definitively rule out coalition talks with Musharraf's party or any others.
Election observers said that despite complaints of irregularities, it appeared that the vote had been largely credible. Beforehand, critics had warned of the likelihood of massive vote-rigging by the ruling party and the government.
Some analysts said the degree of anti-Musharraf sentiment, which swept many of his closest confidants from office, was simply too overwhelming for the government to have attempted to manipulate the vote.
