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Islamabad: Time is running out for President Pervez Musharraf to save himself from the looming ignominy of impeachment, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Saturday.
Talking to reporters at Multan in Punjab province, Qureshi said Musharraf must make the right decision quickly.
"Once the impeachment process starts in the parliament, the situation will change," the foreign minister said.
The local media continued to play up reports that US, UK and Saudi Arabia were making behind-the-scene efforts for a settlement between Musharraf and the ruling coalition.
According to the reports, in return for his resignation Musharraf wants guarantee for an honourable stay in the country with protocol and security against likely threats to his life.
A spokesman for Musharraf on Friday denied the president was ready to resign and said he would reply to the charge sheet when he received it.
Writing on the wall
Minister for Information and Broadcasting Sherry Rehman said yesterday that the president should "read the writing on the wall and step down."
She said that the coalition government would follow the constitution and the law during the whole impeachment process.
Rehman said all the four provincial assemblies which constituted bulk of the electoral college for election of president had already voted against Musharraf.
The National Assembly, the directly elected lower house of the parliament, is expected to follow suit when it resumes proceedings tomorrow after a weekend break.
The information minister said a charge-sheet against the president had been finalised and was being whetted now by the law ministry before being presented to the top leaders of the four-party ruling coalition.
She said the coming impeachment was a parliamentary process and not a trial and the president would have the right to defend himself before the parliament.
"Musharraf must feel the people's mood. The clarion call is loud and clear. They want him to go," wrote former foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmad in an article in a national daily.
Ahmad said General Musharraf could still save himself "from ignominy in history by leaving before the time of reckoning."
The coalition is expected to give a mandatory notice of its intention to impeach the president to the Speaker of the National Assembly next week.
After receiving the notice, the Speaker will have 14 days during which to summon a joint session of the National Assembly and the Senate to take up impeachment motion.
Pakistan Peoples Party co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari said to a domestic private channel that the president should show "maturity" and leave before impeachment.
To a question about the response to the army to the impeachment move, he said the army had no political position. "We do not want to put the army to the test and at the end of the day democracy will win."
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