Word: punjab
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Pakistan has been plunged into a fresh phase of political instability after the country's two main opposition leaders were barred from elected office. The controversial ruling from the Supreme Court has sparked violent and angry protests against the government of President Asif Ali Zardari in Punjab, the largest and wealthiest province of the country. Just as Pakistan's civilian leadership most needs to unite to tame militants, the country's two main political parties have revived their poisonous rivalry, setting off on a potentially destructive confrontation with each other...
...long-awaited ruling, Pakistan's Supreme Court declared on Wednesday that neither former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif nor his brother Shahbaz Sharif, the Chief Minister of Punjab, can stand for elections. The siblings are the leaders of the country's second largest party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). As a result, Nawaz Sharif's ambition of returning to the position of Prime Minister for a historic third time in a future election has been thwarted. More immediately, Shahbaz Sharif has been dislodged from his position as Chief Minister of Punjab, the elected head of the provincial government...
Moments after the decision was announced, angry mobs from the Sharifs' Punjabi power base took to the streets in protest. In Islamabad (a federal territory located within the boundaries of Punjab), young men waving the PML-N's green flags and chanting anti-Zardari slogans seized control of two of the capital's main thoroughfares. Panicked shopkeepers in the bustling Aabpara market swiftly pulled down their shutters and fled the area. The youths torched car tires and attacked cars bearing government license plates. Parts of Lahore, the second largest city and capital of Punjab, were brought to a standstill...
...from the ruling party, many observers believe political opportunism may have been in play. "Put it this way: Zardari did not try to block or prevent the ruling," says Nusrat Javeed, a political commentator. "Indeed, he waited for it to take political advantage of it." Others point out that Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer recently boasted that the PPP would soon be in charge of the province...
Political turmoil will prove a major distraction from Pakistan's faltering fight against Islamic militancy. At a time when the government should be focused on staunching Taliban insurgencies in the northwest, it will now be trying to secure control of Punjab. Javeed believes that the younger Sharif's ejection from the province may prove to be a setback for the entire country. "You can disagree with his very strong style of governance," the commentator says. "But with a growing presence of the Taliban in the south, he was playing a role in stopping their spread. Now there is a vacuum...