ISLAMABAD // The political temperature in ever-tumultuous Pakistan is rising and Asif Ali Zardari, the president and widower of Benazir Bhutto, is feeling the heat. Lawyers, demanding the restoration of Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, the chief justice ousted by Pervez Musharraf, the former president, have announced they will hold a massive protest demonstration and sit-in in Islamabad on March 9.
In the meantime, lawyers are planning to hold demonstrations across the country. Nawaz Sharif, the opposition leader and former a prime minister, has also upped the ante and announced on Tuesday his political party, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, will support the lawyers' protests. At the same time, he is urging people to come out on the streets in support of the lawyers. Relations between him and Mr Zardari were badly strained last year over whether to restore the ousted chief justice.
The fear of a confrontation between the lawyers and Mr Zardari has caused considerable trepidation in the corridors of the president's office as well as the ranks of the ruling Pakistan Peoples' Party. The News, a leading English-language daily, quoted Mr Zardari as assuring his party members on Monday that he alone "will bowl the lawyers out". A high-ranking government official and an aide to Mr Zardari, who spoke on condition of anonymity, downplayed the protest plans by the lawyers and termed them as a "storm in a teacup". The official stressed that the media, especially the television news channels, in the country exaggerates the popular support for Mr Chaudhry and was sensationalising the issue.
"Whatever Pakistan Peoples' Party and Zardari say, they will be eyeing the weeks ahead with a great deal of worry," said Cyril Almeida, an editor at Dawn, an English-language daily newspaper. "The problem is really political. The mood in the lawyers' camp at the moment is confrontational, and their record suggests they are not above violence. A sit-in that turns ugly will be a PR disaster for an eight-month-old government that is already deeply unpopular," Mr Almeida said.
For their part, the lawyers are steadily increasing the pressure on the government. Last week, thousands of lawyers gathered in the eastern city of Lahore and in fiery speeches criticised Mr Zardari for going back on his promise to restore Mr Chaudhry. Mr Chaudhry has enjoyed a wave of popular public support, as he became a symbol of the anti-Musharraf sentiment in the country when Mr Musharraf tried to remove him in a ham-handed way in March 2007.
Since then, the reinstatement of Mr Chaudhry and other judges of the high courts has been the centrepiece of what is popularly known as the "lawyers' movement", setting off a political crisis that helped bring to an end the seven-year long rule of Mr Musharraf. The lawyers movement provided an unprecedented spectacle: thousands in black suits paraded through the avenues of major cities burning effigies of Mr Musharraf, shouting slogans and vowing to defend the rule of law.
The reinstatement of the ousted judges was also a pivotal issue during the campaign for the parliamentary elections last year. But after almost two years, despite the public pressure and clamour by the lawyers, Mr Chaudhry remains unable to get his job back. While Mr Sharif has consistently campaigned for the restoration of Mr Chaudhry, Mr Zardari has been reluctant to do so. Mr Zardari had endured long legal battles on unproven charges of corruption in Pakistan's courts and blamed Mr Chaudhry, among others, for following political orders to pursue the cases against him.
Critics of Mr Zardari said his unwillingness to reinstate the ousted chief justice also stems from a fear that Mr Chaudhry might reverse an amnesty granted by Mr Musharraf that allowed Mr Zardari's corruption cases to be dropped. Mr Sharif, the opposition leader, is himself battling for his political survival. The Supreme Court is hearing a disqualification case against Mr Sharif and his younger brother, Shahbaz Sharif, who is the chief minister of Punjab, the most prosperous and populous of the country's four provinces.
Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, a controversial judge seen as an ally of Mr Zardari, heads the Supreme Court. "If the court bars both Sharifs from holding elected office, they may well decide that the only way back to power is to bring down the PPP government first", Mr Almeida said. Mr Sharif sees in the disgruntled lawyers a potent ally to threaten the stability of the People's Party government. Political analysts said the spectre of political wrangling - while testing the resilience of democracy in the country - could turn ugly.
"Neither the PPP nor the PML-N is playing for a draw," Mr Almeida said. smasood@thenational.ae