Pakistan's Coalition Crumbling

So much for the coalition government led by Nawaz Sharif and Asif Ali Zardari. Sharif has pulled out of the coalition government, which raises questions over who will lead the government. Neither Zardari nor Sharif had enough votes to win the election outright, and Zardari garnered a larger number of votes in the Parliament.

The exit by Mr. Sharif’s party, the Pakistan Muslim League-N, had been expected in the last few days, and was finally spurred by the decision of Mr. Zardari to run for president, in an electoral college vote set for Sept. 6. President Pervez Musharraf resigned last week under threat of impeachment.

The departure of Mr. Sharif, whose party sat uneasily with Mr. Zardari’s Pakistan Peoples Party, is unlikely to result in immediate elections. Mr. Sharif said his members would sit in the opposition in the Parliament and try to play a “constructive” role.

The Pakistan Peoples Party holds the most seats in the Parliament, but not a majority. Political analysts said they expected it would be able to cobble together a new parliamentary coalition with smaller parties.

Still, Pakistan faces continued political instability that may distract from serious governance and serious efforts to turn back the growing strength of the Taliban in the northwestern parts of the nation.

Sharif has claimed that Zardari's party broke promises to share power. The coalition government lasted all of a week. Again, all this goes back to long standing grudges and Sharif probably thinks that he should be in the driver's seat given that he was in power when Musharraf overthrew his government in 1999. The breakup occurred because Zardari refused to give a timeline to reinstate judges that were tossed out of power by Musharraf, while Sharif wanted to see them reinstated immediately.

None of this helps the situation along the Afghan-Pakistani border with a resurgent Taliban that uses Pakistani territory as a safe haven, and from which they can launch attacks against Afghan targets with increasing regularity.

Nearly 100 people were killed in suicide bombings last week. Pakistani Taliban say the attacks were carried out in response to a military campaign against them -- and have threatened more were to come.

The government said Monday it had banned the main Taliban militant umbrella group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and frozen its bank accounts and assets in Pakistan.

The militants in the Bajaur region offered a unilateral ceasefire on Sunday, which the government rejected.