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| 14 April 2004 | Wednesday | 23 Safar 1425 |
Musharraf will honour 17th Amendment: Uniform controversy should end - Rashid
ISLAMABAD, April 13: Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed on Tuesday said President Gen Pervez Musharraf would not go against the 17th Amendment requiring him to leave the office of the army chief by December 31 this year.
Addressing a hurriedly called press conference, the minister said he had been instructed by President Musharraf to end the controversy generated unnecessarily by certain quarters.
The minister said his statement should be taken as an official statement of the president on the issue of uniform as he was speaking after getting clear instructions from the president that he would not go against the 17th Amendment passed by the present parliament.
Sheikh Rashid said that President Musharraf was a man of his word and never backed out of his promises. He held the elections within three years, as promised, and would honour the 17th Amendment as well.
He said the president was dismayed by the attitude of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) which failed to keep its promise on the National Security Council by not voting in favour of the bill, but he had no plans of going against what the 17th Amendment stipulated.
When a reporter pressed the minister to make a clear and unambiguous statement that the president would quit the post of army chief, he said he had said whatever he was required to say. Later, he said the president "would retain one post" on Dec 31.
When the minister's attention was drawn to an interview given by the president to the BBC in which he did not say what the minister was saying on his behalf, Sheikh Rashid said that the interview had been recorded about a week back and what he (Sheikh Rashid) had stated on Tuesday was the latest. The BBC interview would be telecast on Wednesday.
Sheikh Rashid did not say anything about the ministers who had formally called the president on Monday to retain his uniform, and said they were allies of the government and had every right to express their views. He, however, added that those who were demanding that the president not leave the army post were not stating the government policy.
The minister said the president would head the committee which would look into the issue of syllabus and the provincial chief ministers would be part of that committee.
He added that people who had objections to changes in textbooks would also be associated with the committee. The government, Sheikh Rashid said, would not allow anything against Islam and the ideology of Pakistan to go into the syllabus.
Asked to comment on reports concerning Mian Shahbaz Sharif, he said the Supreme Court's decision was clear that every citizen had the right to come back to his country.
He, however, said that the Sharif family had left the country under an agreement that they would not come back to Pakistan for 10 years. "Mian Shahbaz Sharif is also a signatory to the agreement," the minister claimed.
Asked if the president had rejected the demand of the PPP- Patriots, the minister said he would not use the word 'rejected' and had already stated what he was required to say.
Reuters adds: President Musharraf declined to comment in an interview with the BBC, first aired on Tuesday before Sheikh Rashid's briefing, when asked if there were circumstances in which he would not step down as head of the army as planned. "I wouldn't like to comment on it at all," he said.
"But I am certainly cheesed off with the MMA's attitude after the agreements that we had reached with them. They are not participating with us on my vote of confidence which they had promised and also on the NSC."
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