Pakistan's Feuding Leaders Lobby Party Defectors (Update1)

Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistan's feuding political leaders reached out to party defectors to support their candidates to replace former President Pervez Musharraf, two days after disbanding the coalition that forced his resignation. Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, campaigning for Pakistan Peoples Party Co-Head Asif Ali Zardari, met with Aftab Sherpao, a former PPP leader, who left the party after Musharraf took power in a 1999 coup. Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League, which quit the government after Zardari announced his candidacy, said it will try to woo ex-colleagues who broke away in 2000 to set up a pro-Musharraf faction of the party. Independent lawmakers and party defectors hold the key to Sharif's attempt to dislodge presidential frontrunner Zardari, the widower of slain leader Benazir Bhutto, after the PPP won the most seats in Feb. 18 parliamentary elections. Sharif, a two-time prime minister, has nominated former chief justice Saeed-uz-Zaman Siddiqui for the Sept. 6 vote. ``We are hoping to win as many votes as possible,'' Gilani told reporters in Islamabad today. Sherpao, whose party has one seat in the lower house and six members in the North West Frontier Province assembly, said he hasn't decided whether to vote for Zardari. The two main parties are focusing on smaller groups because their largest rival, the pro-Musharraf faction of the Pakistan Muslim League, headed by Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, is backing its own candidate, Mushahid Hussain. The winner requires 51 percent of electoral college votes, which include tallies from both chambers of parliament and the four provincial assemblies. `Zardari Will Win' ``In today's situation, Zardari will win the election without any major challenge,'' said Zafar Nawaz Jaspal, assistant professor of International Relations at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad. ``Still, there are a few days to go and if back-channel diplomacy between the two factions of the Muslim League succeed, the smaller groups and independent lawmakers may rethink supporting the PPP.'' Siddiqui, 71, ``is the best candidate because he is honorable and honest and supports democracy,'' said Siddiq-ul- Farooq, a spokesman for Sharif's party. The party will try to convince the pro-Musharraf faction to withdraw its candidate and support Siddiqui, he said. Smaller groups including the Karachi-based Mutahidda Qaumi Movement and the Awami National Party, based in the North West Frontier Province, have already said they will back Zardari. Muster Votes Zardari, 52, may muster 400 votes in the electoral college of 702, the Nation newspaper reported on Aug. 25. Sharif's party might win 126 votes and the pro-Musharraf candidate 129 votes, it said. Even if they combine, the two Muslim Leagues don't have enough support to upset Zardari, it said. Lawmakers from smaller groups and independents, who do not belong to any party, typically side with the ruling party, Quaid-e-Azam University's Jaspal said. Musharraf quit last week to avoid facing impeachment charges that he illegally ousted Sharif in a 1999 coup. While the four-party alliance headed by the PPP worked together to remove the president, the coalition splintered Aug. 25 after Zardari reneged on pledges to reinstate 60 judges fired by Musharraf and to select a presidential candidate. The PPP-led government today reinstated eight High Court judges in Sindh province, GEO television channel reported. The judges took fresh oaths, or were reappointed, before returning to office, it said. Replacing Judges Sharif, 58, united with Zardari over the need to remove Musharraf, then bickered over replacing judges with the ones the former president fired. Zardari wants to keep the Musharraf judges, who backed legislation withdrawing corruption charges against him and his wife, while also reinstating the fired ones. Zardari denies the corruption accusations. Restoring former chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry was been the biggest obstacle to an agreement because he questioned the legality of a 2007 decree that protected Zardari. Squabbling between Sharif's party and the PPP since they formed the alliance in March has hampered the efforts by the government of the nuclear-armed nation to tackle extremism in its tribal region bordering Afghanistan. Terrorist attacks last year killed 2,000 people in the country of 168 million. The benchmark Karachi Stock Exchange 100 index today completed a six-day, 16 percent decline, closing at 9,144.93, a 26-month low. Pakistan's economy expanded 5.8 percent in the fiscal year ended June 30, the slowest pace since 2003, and the trade deficit widened to a record $20.7 billion. Inflation accelerated to 24.3 percent in July and foreign-exchange reserves have declined by more than half. Moody's Investors Service last week said reserve depletion was the ``most imminent risk.''