Nawaz Sharif barred from Pakistan election
A court rules that the popular former prime minister, an opponent of President Pervez Musharraf, cannot run for parliament because of a conviction.
KARACHI, PAKISTAN — One of Pakistan's most popular politicians was barred by a court Monday from running for a seat in parliament, a ruling likely to heighten tensions within the governing coalition and intensify debate over the status of the country's judiciary.
The provincial high court in Lahore, in eastern Pakistan, declared Nawaz Sharif ineligible to run in a by-election scheduled for Thursday because of a disputed criminal conviction. Sharif is the head of the junior party in the ruling coalition, which soundly defeated the party of President Pervez Musharraf in February elections.
For the time being, the decision dashes whatever hopes Sharif, a former prime minister, might have harbored of regaining the post. The prime minister must be a member of parliament.
The issue of Sharif's legal disqualification is a particularly weighty one, coming when the coalition is beset by internal struggles over whether to reinstate dozens of senior judges fired and replaced by Musharraf last year during emergency rule.
The two men have a bitter political history: Musharraf, then the army chief of staff, deposed Sharif in a 1999 coup and sent him into exile.
Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League-N, denounced Monday's decision and questioned the court's legitimacy.
"This is a mockery of democracy," said Ahsan Iqbal, a senior member of Sharif's party. "This will make Pakistan look like a banana republic."
The Pakistan People's Party, led by the late Benazir Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, was more circumspect in its response. Party spokesman Farhatullah Babar said he was "dismayed and disappointed" by the verdict, but said it was up to Sharif's party as to how to respond.
An appeal is considered unlikely because the country's Supreme Court is stacked with judges appointed by Musharraf late last year after he fired the popular chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry.
Sharif's party has made the reinstatement of the previous judiciary its top priority; Zardari has said he supports such a move in principle but wants to go about it via a set of complicated amendments to the Pakistani Constitution.
Those amendments have yet to be taken up by lawmakers.
Monday's court decision in effect overturned a ruling by the Election Commission, which said Sharif could run in the by-election even though he had been banned from the February elections. Winning a seat in parliament would have enhanced his stature and left open the prospect of an eventual move into the top political post.
