President Pervez Musharraf does not intend to quit, an ally said Monday after Pakistan's main opposition parties agreed to form a coalition and restore judges who could threaten his grip on power. Musharraf huddled with legal aides a day after Asif Ali Zardari and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif signed a coalition pact following last month's general elections.
Zardari is the de facto leader of Pakistan People's Party (PPP), which won the most seats in the February 18 ballot and, along with Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), trounced Musharraf's political backers.
In a major blow to Musharraf, a key US ally in the "war on terror", they also agreed to bring back, within the first 30 days of the new parliament, the judges ousted by the president during emergency rule last November.
Asked whether the president would step down if parliament gives the judges back their jobs, close Musharraf ally and former deputy information minister Tariq Azeem told AFP: "It does not look like it."
"Now the question is that how can it (restoring the deposed judges) be done, through a parliamentary resolution, simple majority or a two-thirds majority. It is a legal issue basically," Azeem said.
Government officials said Musharraf was "meeting legal aides" at his office in the garrison city of Rawalpindi but did not give details on what was being discussed. Private television channels said it was a "strategy meeting" including legal and constitutional advisers. Pressure on him to resign has grown since the elections, and the fate of the sacked judges was one of the main sticking points in forming a coalition between Zardari and Sharif.
The two parties thrashed out their differences at the talks on Sunday and also called on Musharraf to inaugurate parliament as soon as possible. Caretaker prime minister Mohammedmian Soomro on Monday sent Musharraf a formal recommendation to convene the national assembly, or lower house, a senior official in the premier's secretariat said.