We’ll find out the date of the President’s ‘departure’ today. Obviously, we know that the office he’ll vacate will be the army office and not the presidential one. Once it is established that the President will be vacating one office, we might get a lot of petitions questioning the President’s ability to stand for re-elections.
Considering the response of the SC in this case, I would assume that they would not create any issues for Musharraf to stand for re-election as they believe it will ‘derail the system’. That is a valid point. But things must be seen in light of the existing law. A lot will depend on how liberally the SC interprets the law. Undoubtedly, there are no signs of the SC’s importance abating in the near future.
Is this really Pakistan’s turning point for the future? Or the fact that people like Benazir are stakeholders in it and actively discussing it means that we have already passed the moment where it ceased to be our turning point? It seems to me to be the latter. One could argue there have been several breakthroughs in media, judiciary etc. but it doesn’t seem like that could form the foundations a new page in Pakistan’s history. We’ll have to wait a little longer for our moment of glory.