Pakistan's two biggest opposition parties sought to thrash out their choice for prime minister yesterday after agreeing to form a coalition government that could drive Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf from power.
Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and the widowed husband of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto said their parties, once bitter rivals, would join forces after trouncing Musharraf's allies in elections this week.
Officials from both parties said the frontrunner to be prime minister was Makhdoom Amin Fahim, the widely respected vice president of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP).
A senior PPP official said Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, and Sharif "discussed the name of Makhdoom Amin Fahim as the future premier" during their meeting late on Thursday.
A decision was not made yesterday.
"It is not expected today," a PPP official told reporters.
The proposed alliance between the parties brings them nearer the two-thirds majority they would need to seek Musharraf's impeachment, analysts say.
Musharraf vowed in an opinion article for the Washington Post to work with the new parliament to tackle the three key tasks he said were facing Pakistan: defeating terrorism; forging a stable government; and creating the foundation for sustained economic growth.
"Because these goals are shared by the vast majority of Pakistanis, I am certain we can and will accomplish them, and I stand ready to work with the newly elected parliament to achieve these objectives," he wrote.
All the PPP's members of parliament were gathering in Islamabad yesterday to discuss the agreement between Zardari and Sharif, party spokesman Farhatullah Babar told reporters.
Neither Zardari nor Sharif are immediately eligible to be premier because they are not members of parliament -- Sharif was barred from standing, and Bhutto's husband did not do so because his wife was still alive when nomination papers were filed.
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