Pakistan's Musharraf says he won't step down
Wow.... like I didn't see this happening. What a Tit-Twit.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNe...0220/musharraf_stay_080220/20080220?hub=World
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf intends to serve out his five-year term as head of state and will not step down, his spokesman said, despite a sweeping election victory by his opponents -- some of whom want to drive him from power.
Final results from this week's parliamentary poll were expected Wednesday but with the count nearly complete, two opposition parties have won enough seats to form a new government, though they will likely fall short of the two-thirds needed to impeach the president.
So far, they have garnered 154 of the 268 contested seats, the Election Commission said.
But Musharraf's spokesman Rashid Quereshi said Tuesday the president intends to work with the new government and will serve out his term that expires in 2012.
"The people on Monday didn't vote to elect a new president,'' he said.
"In fact, they participated in the elections to elect the new Parliament.''
OOooooo Ok.... well never mind then. :angry3: what a back stabbing, two-faced.... well the rest of my words chosen shouldn't be posted I suppose.
The new government, expected to be installed by mid-March, will determine how to tackle the country's formidable challenges, including rising prices and the threat from Islamic extremism.
How about the problem of a nut job as president who killed his only competition in the election, still lost, and still will not step down?
Pakistan's new leaders must also decide how to deal with Musharraf, who seized power in a 1999 coup and went on to become a key ally in the U.S. war on terror, an unpopular decision in the Muslim country of 160 million.
Exactly! How the living fok can this idiot claim some loophole of him not stepping down, and plans on not leaving until 2012, when he himself took over power in an illegal act to begin with? Hypocracy if I ever saw any and making the rules as he pleases.
His decisions to suspend the constitution, purge the judiciary and round up political opponents sent his approval ratings plummeting and the sound defeat suffered by the pro-Musharraf party was widely seen as a repudiation of the president.
Speaking Tuesday in Lahore, Nawaz Sharif, a former prime minister and leader of the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-N, recalled statements by Musharraf last year that he would step down if he lost the support of the Pakistani people.
There you have it... he's a friggin hypocrite who's fixated on his own mental delusions that he is the only "Savior" for Pakistan, and will say anything he possibly can to buy him more time as he keeps control in his hands. He's done it countless times in the past with the US and telling them what they want to hear, he's done it countless times in the past to his own people, and he's still doing it FFS!
"He has closed his eyes,'' Sharif said in Lahore.
"He has said before that he would go when the people want him to do so and now the people have given their verdict.''
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal newspaper posted Tuesday on the newspaper's website, Musharraf confirmed he intends to remain in office and work with the new government.
"We have to move forward in a way that we bring about a stable democratic government to Pakistan,'' he said.
Which will happen once he's thrown out of power.
He agreed the election outcome was a reflection of Pakistanis' dissatisfaction with his government, citing economic problems and his attempt to rein in judges, as well as sympathy for the opposition after the assassination of their charismatic leader, Benazir Bhutto.
"All these things had a negative impact,'' Musharraf said.
Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, said Tuesday he would meet soon with Sharif and other opposition leaders "to form a government of national unity.''
Zardari made clear he would not include politicians who had been allied with Musharraf.
"We will seek support from democratic forces to form the government but we are not interested in any of those people who are part and parcel of the previous government,'' said Zardari, though he carefully avoided an unequivocal statement about whether Musharraf should remain in power.
U.S. Senator John Kerry, who met Tuesday with Musharraf along with other U.S. legislators, said the president expressed his willingness to work with the new government.
But the former general is so unpopular among the Pakistani public opposition parties are likely to find little reason to work with him -- particularly since he no longer controls the powerful army.
At best, Musharraf faces the prospect of remaining in power with sharply diminished powers, even if the opposition fails to muster the two-thirds support in Parliament to impeach him.
If not, then just do what he does and assasinate him and then blame it on extremists.
White House press secretary Dana Perino, travelling with President George W. Bush in Africa, said it is too soon to know whether the election has weakened Musharraf's power.
:-?
"I think what President Musharraf has shown is an ability to provide for the country a chance to be confident in their government,'' she said.
Pakistani analysts said the results pointed to broad support for centrist, democratic parties at the expense of patronage politicians and Islamist movements.
The pro-Taliban Jamiat-e-Ulema, or JUI, party won only three seats in the national Parliament. And a coalition of Islamist religious parties was expected to lose control of the regional administration in the North West Frontier Province, which it won in the 2002 elections.
Unofficial returns showed the secular Awami National party had won 31 of the 96 contested seats in the provincial assembly, with the religious United Action Forum taking only nine seats.
At least Castro had some sense and told it how it was and how it's going to be..... This ass-clown is two facing and backstabbing everybody for his own personal power trip. He said so himself he would leave if the country didn't want him there.... they don't, and now he's saying he'll stay in power regardless?
How the hell can the US continue support for this guy?
How the hell can this continue to go on as it is?
How much more tripe will everybody swallow before they take this weaseley-looking freak bag out?
It's crazy people like this who can not realize they are defeated whom are to fear. Esspecially when they're close to the nukes. Sure he's not in control of the nukes, or the military which controls them, but that means very little based on the overall situation at hand.
The opposition PPP is celebrating the election result
