Word: referendums
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...more significant may have been an unprecedented domestic challenge to the government over the past week, in the form of the Varela initiative. The organizers have operated within their rights defined by the Cuban constitution and collected 11,000 signatures on a petition to the legislature calling for a referendum on freedom of speech, amnesty for political prisoners, the creation of private businesses and electoral reforms. Cuban law now requires that the National Assembly debate the proposal...
PAKISTAN Tainted Win President Pervez Musharraf claimed an overwhelming mandate to govern the country for another five years after results of a referendum gave him 95% of the vote. But the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that polling irregularities, including multiple voting, "exceeded our worst fears." Musharraf seized power in a military coup in October...
...Pakistan's major political and religious parties have stood against the vote, but quietly, because opposition rallies are banned. Qazi Hussain Ahmad who heads the Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan's largest religious party, was arrested briefly last week after calling the referendum "farcical" and trying to lead a small protest. Musharraf has also been attacking the country's exiled former Prime Ministers, as they are the only rivals who might muster significant political support. "Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto have no role in Pakistani politics, this should be clear," he declared in a recent televised speech. Pakistan People's Party...
...message is clear: so long as Musharraf stays in lockstep with Washington's antiterror objectives, he can do pretty much what he pleases at home. Privately, however, U.S. officials have expressed reservations about the referendum. "It doesn't seem like the greatest tactic," says a State Department official. "It'd be better if he just let the Parliament make him President." But real democracy is a messy, unpredictable business. "It does not simply mean elections," says political scientist Rizvi. "It also means you must compromise, and you may lose some power." That, for now, is not something Musharraf is willing...
...President packs a silver-plated derringer in his chest pocket and only leaves his office in an armor-plated Mercedes, using two others as decoys. Musharraf relies on the ISI for his security. He has found other uses for the group, too. In the run-up to the referendum in April to extend his term as President, he is using ISI officials to cajole some local politicians over to his side, by appeals to their nationalism...