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ISLAMABAD,Pakistan-Allies of President Pervez Musharraf said Saturday they would field another candidate for Pakistan's prime minister after withdrawing their original nominee a day earlier.The reversal appeared to be due to a disagreement between the country's two main pro-Musharraf parties.One of the parties, Karachi-based Mutahida Qaumi Movement, or MQM, withdrew its candidate as a "good will gesture" to slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto's followers,who won the most parliamentary seats in elections last month.The MQM withdrew Farooq Sattar's candidacy late Friday after meetings in London and Karachi, said lawmaker Haider Abbas Rizvi.But Musharraf's own party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, said Saturday that it planned to field a candidate to be announced Sunday. Party chairman and president Chaudry Shujaat Hussain said the Sattar's withdrawal did not reflect the will of all pro-Musharraf lawmakers."We will contest the election. We have made this decision," Hussain told reporters Saturday in Islamabad.The reversal means whomever is nominated by Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party will not run uncontested.Makhdoom Amin Fahim, an aristocratic party stalwart, has long been considered the front-runner for prime minister. As vice-chair of the Pakistan People's Party, he led Bhutto's followers in parliament during her nearly eight-year exile.But the party has stalled on nominating Fahim amid speculation that Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto's husband and political heir, wants the job. He is currently ineligible because he does not hold a parliamentary seat. However, he could appoint a stand-in and run for a seat in a by-election within months.The battle for prime minister has strained party unity-even before it forms a coalition government that faces massive challenges including a wave of Islamic militancy, high inflation and electricity shortages.The new administration will be led by followers of Bhutto and another ex-premier, Nawaz Sharif, who was ousted in Musharraf's 1999 coup.A confrontation still looms between Musharraf and Sharif, who has been one of the most vocal in calling for the unpopular president's resignation or impeachment.Zardari and Bhutto's 19-year-old son are expected to announce a candidate Saturday evening, ahead of a vote two days later in parliament. After confirmation by parliament, the new premier is set to take an oath from Musharraf on Tuesday, said presidential spokesman Rashid Qureshi.Bhutto's son was appointed party chairman after his mother died in a December suicide attack, but his father is running things while the 19-year-old continues his studies at Oxford University.A Friday editorial in one of Pakistan's main English-language dailies, The News, decried the PPP's "bitter infighting" and "clumsy manner" in which the choice of a premier has been conducted."The plan from the Zardari camp seems to be based around the rather optimistic premise that Fahim may not be willing to confront young Bilawal, both because of his age and because of the emotional standing he carries as the son of the slain Benazir Bhutto," the editorial said.As in the days of Noah....
