Islamabad - Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf on Friday
made a series of top-level military appointments ahead of elections
expected to win him a new term.
The shake-up came three days after he publicly pledged to step
down as army chief if re-elected in a parliamentary vote scheduled
for October 6 and before he is sworn in as president for five more
years.
Musharraf appointed the former head of Military Intelligence,
Nadeem Taj, as the new chief of the pre-eminent military spy
agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), according to an army
statement.
Taj was promoted from Major General to Lieutenant General,
together with five other officers assigned to new posts.
He replaces ISI chief Ashfaq Pervez Kiani, who is a prime
candidate to take over from Musharraf as chief of army staff when the
president relinquishes his military status.
Newly promoted officers will take over various posts, including at
the Army General Headquarters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi and
in the anti-narcotics force.
Such shake-ups are keenly watched in a country that has been under
military rule for more than half of its 60-year existence.
Observers saw the move as being aimed at ensuring that loyalists
are firmly in control of key branches of the military and associated
structures when the president assumes a fully civilian status.
Musharraf is expected to win a further mandate with the support of
the ruling Pakistan Muslim League in the upcoming vote by national
and provincial parliamentary assemblies.
But the military ruler has experienced a rapid slump in his
popularity this year amid rising Islamic militancy and intense
opposition activity after his suspension of the country's chief
justice in March.
Musharraf's close counter-terrorism cooperation with the United
States has also eroded public support for him.
There has been growing opposition to controversial amendments to
the constitution and in parliament allowing Musharraf to serve as
both president and army chief until November 2007.
Unmoved by his pledge to resign from the army, opposition parties
continue to push petitions in the Supreme Court - headed by the
recently reinstated Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry - challenging the
legality of his re-election in uniform.
The court in Islamabad has been urged to have Musharraf
disqualified as a candidate, although there has been speculation that
he may declare emergency rule if the court obstructs his re-election.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur 
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