By By Tariq Butt
Apart from the then desperate and cornered Musharraf, Lt-Gen (retd) Hamid Javed, Tariq Aziz, Farooq H Naek, Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Rehman Malik, Safdar Abbasi, the then Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) chief Lt-Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi played varying roles, an aide of the then president told The News on condition of anonymity.
He said that these actors gave their inputs at different stages in the process of finalising the NRO. The controversial NRO is now before parliament for a final decision about its fate. Petitions are also pending in the Supreme Court. As the story narrated by the former Musharraf aide, who opted to be in the background since his ouster, the substantive talks about quashing corruption and criminal cases against Benazir Bhutto, Asif Ali Zardari and a multitude of others were held when Musharraf met the Pakistan Peopleís Party (PPP) chairperson for the first time in Abu Dhabi in July 2007. The meeting followed a hectic campaign by senior American and British officials to bring about a rapprochement between Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto and intense talks between Hamid Javed with Benazir Bhutto and her confidants in London.
As Musharraf sought PPPís support in his October 2007 re-election, Benazir Bhutto expressed willingness, by boycotting the polls, but demanded two things in exchange ñ undoing of the embargo on her to serve as prime minister for the third term and all corruption and criminal cases registered in Pakistan and abroad against her, Zardari and others.
The source said that she had argued that she wanted her demands to be met to show to her party that she agreed to support Musharraf in his re-election in exchange for something concrete. She had insisted that all the cases were false and politically motivated, and nothing had been proved.
On his return, Musharraf discussed her demands with his aides. He was ready to accept at least one demand but was yet to take his main political ally, the Chaudhrys of Gujrat, into confidence before responding to her, the aide said.
"I am going to Lahore this weekend and will discuss these demands with the Chaudhrys," Musharraf then told his associates. "Sir, just tell them your decision and don't seek their opinion," one of them advised him.
At the same time, majority of his confidants advised him to accept the demand about scrapping the third term ban but reject her plea about dispensing with the corruption and criminal cases on the ground that there was a general perception that these were correct and well founded. "We had opposed the undoing of the cases," the Musharraf aide said.
According to him, the Chaudhrys insisted during their meeting with Musharraf that Benazir Bhutto's demand about the annulment of cases should be accepted and the one pertaining to the third term restriction should be turned down.
They argued that the cancellation of the third term bar would give a negative message to the voters against the Pakistan Muslim League-Q (PML-Q) in the next general elections and they would think that Benazir Bhutto has been cleared to be prime minister.
However, when contacted by The News, Chaudhry Shujaat categorically denied that he or Pervaiz Elahi had approved the cessation of corruption and criminal cases against Zardari, Benazir Bhutto and others.
The Chaudhrys used to express their reservations against the NRO even when it was promulgated and Musharraf was in power. They are now the frontline critics of this ordinance and have vowed to oppose it tooth and nail in parliament.
The aide said that the draft of the NRO was prepared by prominent lawyer Barrister Shahid Hamid, brother of the then PML-Q minister Zahid Hamid (now a PML-N MNA), in consultation with the then federal law secretary Justice Mansoor Ahmed. Being a confidant lawyer of Benazir Bhutto Farooq H Naek had given his own input in authoring the NRO.
However, when approached by this correspondent for comments, Shahid Hamid categorically denied that he had drafted the NRO. "I was not even remotely connected with it. How could I do so when I am a private practicing lawyer?"
But the source said that despite the fact that Shahid Hamid had agreed to draft the NRO and had actually prepared it, he was strongly against this kind of law even at that time. About the approach and policy of the then ruling party, the aide said, it used to remain divided whenever its meetings were held in Musharraf's presence to ponder over this issue.
Asked whether the termination of criminal cases of serious nature against the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leaders and workers were also kept in view while drafting the NRO, the aide said that the party's high-ups had been arguing with Musharraf since long that they had been grossly wronged and victimised on political grounds. Keeping this in view, he said, the application date of the NRO, January 1, 1986, was inserted in the ordinance although it had nothing to do with the corruption cases against Benazir Bhutto, Zardari and others.
At no stage, the PML-N was either involved or taken into confidence about the preparation and finalisation of the NRO or the secret talks held for this purpose. The cut-off date of the application of the NRO was Oct 12, 1999 when Musharraf had promulgated the martial law and all the cases against the Sharif brothers and other PML-N leaders were instituted after this date.