LAHORE, June 23: Under a package of constitutional amendments being hammered out by the National Reconstruction Bureau, the president will be empowered to appoint a non-MNA as prime minister. He will have six months to get himself elected.

According to reports, parties will have to hold internal elections before the October polls and presidents of all parties will be required to submit lists of their central and provincial office-bearers to the Chief Election Commissioner.

Such steps are of far reaching consequences and are likely to create a stir in the ranks of political parties, specially the ones which have substantial popular support and have been ruling the country in the past and stand a chance in the future. Parties which think they can achieve the required majority in the forthcoming elections may also not like to surrender their right to choose their own leader to the president.

Empowering the president to nominate even an unelected person as prime minister means that he many not trust any of some 360 MNAs-elect capable of forming government. This also means that for a candidate to become prime minister, it will be better not to take part in the elections and waste time and money to get votes. People having good relations with the president may get themselves nominated for the top slot when the electoral process is over.

Such a procedure of nominating prime ministers reduces the electoral process to a mockery. It also undermines the importance of political parties which, on account of their majority, may be able to form government.

Though the same procedure was applied in 1985 to make sitting Sindh High Court judge, Justice Ghous Ali Shah, chief minister of the province, it was not liked by anyone, except, perhaps, the beneficiary. A PML leader as a federal law minister had said it was unconstitutional on the part of Gen Ziaul Haq to have appointed an unelected person as provincial chief executive.

Going by Pakistan’s political culture where people change their loyalties like desert sands once they receive a signal from powers that be, it will not be difficult even for a non-entity to have himself elected as MNA while working as prime minister for six months. Once somebody is nominated to the coveted post, the electorate get the message that he is the man who has to run the country. The prime minister-designate will use all his powers to solve problems of the constituency from where he wants to have himself returned. The state machinery will also work for his victory and there is no question of his losing the election, even if he chooses a constituency where he is a stranger. Getting a vote of confidence will also not be difficult for such people. When the legislators know the individual enjoying the support of the president — and the establishment — they will be scrambling to repose trust in him.

The NRB plan indicates that political parties, no matter how large public support they may have, will not be able to bring leaders of their own choice to the fore. The plan effectively slams doors on former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif whom Gen Pervez Musharraf is determined to keep out of power at all costs.

The scheme, the warp and weft of which has been prepared and is expected to be made public very soon, will benefit people like Farooq Leghari and Imran Khan, which are big names but are without public support. The plan also carries a ray of hope for Mr Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, who has been brought out of political oblivion and made head of the National Alliance, a coalition of half a dozen worthless political parties.

Some say Gen Musharraf, ultimately, may go for partyless elections to implement his agenda in its entirety — without any hurdles. If he does so, he will only be following in the footsteps of the late Gen Ziaul Haq who had a firm grip on power for all the eleven years he ruled the country before dying in boots in an air crash.

Ostensibly, it will be difficult for the government to go for non-party elections because seats for technocrats cannot be filled in the absence of political parties. Or else the government will have to modify the earlier decision of raising the number of assembly seats and providing for the procedure of electing technocrats.

Many political leaders say the procedure of electing technocrats, as of today, will make it difficult for political parties to form alliances. In case they do, how will such parties be able to elect technocrats from their platforms.

It is, probably, for this reason that most parties talk of making adjustments with others instead of forming political alliances.

Since other vital powers, previously available to the prime minister, are also being returned to the president, it will be the president who will be calling the shots. The prime minister will be reduced to a rubber stamp. He will be able to stay only if the president wants him to stay on. Otherwise, the National Security Council, crammed with the nominees of the president, will recommend his dismissal any time.

Implementation of all the step now on the anvil of the NRB, in effect, will change the system of government from parliamentary to presidential. And it is for the experts to decide whether such drastic steps will amount to changing the fundamental character of the constitution, prohibited by the Supreme Court.

The condition of internal elections of parties and requiring the party heads to submit list of their office-bearers to the Chief Election Commissioner will create a lot of difficulties for the PPP and the PML(N).

The PPP has no culture of internal elections and Ms Benazir Bhutto has already been chosen life chairperson. If the party has to hold internal elections before the October elections, it will certainly be very difficult for it to meet the deadline. And if it does not complete the exercise, it may be barred from taking part in the elections.

Also, to be able to submit lists to the CEC, Ms Bhutto will have to come back to Pakistan. And in the present situation she faces arrest the moment she sets foot on Pakistan’s soil.

Equally difficult is the situation for the PML(N). Mian Nawaz Sharif, though in exile in Saudi Arabia, is heading the party. Makhdoom Javed Hashmi is acting president. Now either it is the chairman (Raja Zafarul Haq) or president (Nawaz Sharif) who will be required to submit the list of party office-bearers. Mr Hashmi will have no locus standi, unless Mr Sharif is out of the arena and the former federal minister is declared party chief.

Since Mr Hashmi is in the NAB custody on corruption charges, he, perhaps, will not be eligible to hold any party office if he is convicted.

Whatever other consequences of the whole scheme, it will be difficult for the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy to accept it. The ARD’s patience is almost about to exhaust with the government’s failure to accept any of its demands. The latest scheme may force the coalition to go for a decisive battle to have it settled once and for all whether it is the army which is to rule the country or the politicians.

ARD chief Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan has repeatedly said unless the elections are free and fair and the sovereignty of the assemblies is guaranteed, there will be no use contesting the elections, no matter what opinion his other allies in the ARD have.