Dec 14, 2007
On Emergency’s Last Day, Musharraf Issues Some Decrees
Emergency rule will likely end tomorrow and so Pervez Musharraf has been busy utilizing his soon-to-be-gone self-given powers to amend the constitution by decree.
Last night, he issued an ordinance formally institutionalizing the National Command Authority (NCA)– established in February 2000. The ten-member body “exercise[s] complete command and control over all nuclear and space related technologies, systems and matters.”
The president chairs the NCA with the prime minister as vice chairman. Its remaining members are the foreign, defense, and interior ministers; chiefs of the army, naval, air force staff; the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff committee; and the director general of the Strategic Plans Division, who also serves as secretary general of the group.
Musharraf will also issue five other ordinances, one of which will reportedly satiate Benazir Bhutto (and indirectly Nawaz Sharif) by lifting the bar on a third prime ministerial term.
Now the emergency is over with amendments in the constitution. So emergency was actually to mould things just as Musharraf wanted and the law n order situation is still there. But here Pakistan is gearing up for another elections early next year, and for an indepth analysis, news and, discussion, and extensive debate, click on
Pakistan Elections 2008