So what lies ahead for Mr. Zardari? On his plate are many a burning issue - a raging war in the tribal regions, an economy in doldrums, a power crisis, a judicial crisis - the list goes on and on.

Asif Zardari has promised that the future President will be subervient to the Parliament - and has promised to shift the balance of power back to the Parliament, by doing away with powers that made previous Presidents like Pervez Musharraf all-powerful - the 17th Amendment, and Article 58(2)B, which allows the President to dissolve the assemblies.

But what do the people really want? Everyone I spoke to on the streets of Karachi this morning really do not care about who occupies the seat of the President. They want relief from rising inflation, the power crisis and a secure nation, where they can raise their children. This is what the PPP had promised them when they were voted in in February this year, and this is what the people believe PPP has failed to deliver.

So whether Asif Zardari is corrupt or not, whether he deserves his position in power or not are questions that are now irrelevant. What Mr. Zardari must realize is that this country is facing issues of immense importance - which threaten the very existence of Pakistan - and if he and his party does not work to solve these issues, they may soon find themselves back to where they stood on October 12, 1999.

The inevitable has finally happened: Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) leader Nawaz Sharif announced today that his party is leaving the coalition government, citing differences with the PPP over reinstatement of the judges, and the nomination of Asif Zardari as presidential candidate.

So where does the country go from here? Nawaz Sharif announced his party’s presidential candidate, Justice (retired) Saeeduzzaman Siddiqui, the former Chief Justice of Pakistan, who had resigned in protest on taking a fresh oath of office after Musharraf took over the country in 1999.

On the other hand, Asif Zardari is all set to become the next President of the Pakistan, as his party, with the support of other allies, are expected to muster up a majority in the Lower and Upper House.

So what happens to the judges? Asif Zardari, in a recent interview said the deposed judges, who had been sacked by President Musharraf last year, have become highly politicized. While some may agree that the judges will not be able to play an impartial role if they are reinstated, many agree that the judges must be reinstated, if only to set a precedent that the rule of law is above the rule of a military dictator.

All that said, Nawaz Sharif’s decision to finally leave the government has at least put an end to the indecision and battle of political statements, but it is yet another blow for the fragile state of Pakistan.

More than a day has passed since Pervez Musharraf stepped down in what was a move that was long overdue. Following his resignation, Pakistanis have experienced different emotions: relief, that the impeachment drama is finally over, and a sense of dread, of what lies ahead. Despite having achieved their long-desired goal of getting rid of Musharraf, the coalition partners still cannot decide on how and when to restore the deposed judges that Musharraf sacked last November.

And that is just the least of their problems. The increasing inflation has left Pakistanis wringing their hands, even though there was a slight respite yesterday when the Karachi Stock Exchange recovered after the resignation announcement. The security situation in the tribal regions is yet another problem that has no easy and immediate fix. Just today, 30 people were killed in Dera Ismail Khan after a suicide bomber belonging to Baitullah Mehsud’s group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan struck a local hospital.

But all problems aside, there is at least some consolation. Democracy has finally been given a much-needed revival shot, and the Pakistani nation has bid farewell to its fourth military ruler, who like the ones before him, believed he alone could save the country. The coalition partners in the government must realize that exactly six months after they swept the general elections, they have been given a chance to live up to their promises. Whether they do so or not is a question that can only be answered in the future, but they must save Pakistan before it plunges into the abyss that many failed nations have fallen into before it.

Today, Pakistan is celebrating its 61st Independence Day. But for an indication on how the country has been faring, 15 minutes before midnight, a suicide bomber struck a police station in Lahore, leaving five people dead and dozens injured.

So where do we stand, over six decades later, and what does it mean to be a Pakistani?

We stand on the precipice of a ever-crumbling mountain, hanging on by a rapidly fraying thread. That thread is constantly fraying for reasons more than one, but the questions that I and many of my friends have been grappling with is who are we, and will this country even survive a year from now?

So what does it mean to be Pakistani? We are divided on what province we belong to, what religious sect we follow, what city we live in, what version of Urdu we speak.

It wasn’t this way. No one used to care, we just knew that we were Pakistani. Thanks to the policies of our former rulers, our ethnicity and religion now comes before who we really are. And this question is not going to be answered anytime soon, as each successive government fails to realize or perhaps does not want to address the issue of identity.

And whether this country will survive or not - even the option to answer that is not in our hands. Pakistan’s breakup has been already mapped out by one too many think tanks, as we fight insurgencies after insurgencies, failing to address the issues that really matter - resources to provinces, provincial autonomy, a weaning away from our Western allies..the list goes on.

So on this Independence Day, as I sit watching speeches on television and endless national songs, I am reminded more than ever, how patriotism has become a storage item, to be dusted off and taken out of the attic every 14th August and paraded on television, while the Pakistani nation looks on and tries to remember what it was to feel like this country was ours, truly truly ours.

Fresh accusations by the Bush administration have emerged recently that Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the dreaded Inter-Services Intelligence is assisting militants in the tribal areas ahead of strikes by U.S. forces has put the spotlight on this infamous agency’s workings once again.

The allegations followed a botched attempt by the Pakistani government to bring the ISI under the control of the Interior Ministry, a notification that they withdrew hours later. Skeptics and defence analysts have argued that there has to be some control maintained over the agency, which for years has functioned independently of the state. The ISI is supposed to report to the Prime Minister, but critics argue that that is not the case. The ISI has also come under much criticism over the past few years, after thousands of people went missing in the country, many believed to be in the custody of the intelligence agencies.

The ISI has a turbulent relationship with the United States, but an extremely close one with the militants the U.S is now hoping to eradicate, whether its through Predator drone led attacks, or by covert operations.

Ex-members of the ISI, including General (retired) Hameed Gul have allegedly maintained links with various militant organizations that they helped create in the 80s, who helped create thousands of mujahideen at the expense of U.S and Saudi Arabian aid to fight the Soviet-Afghan war. Many feel that Pakistan turning its back on the very people it helped create post 9/11 was a mistake, and one that Pakistan should not have committed, since the mujahideen were helping fight the decades old Kashmir conflict. The flip side of the argument is that it will take years before the militants are weeded out of the area. However, this will not happen before the powers that be stop all covert support to the groups that are currently fighting for power in the war-weary tribal regions of Pakistan. But most important of all, the ISI must be depoliticized and it must be brought back under the control of the civilian government.

In 2005, there were four bomb blasts in London, later dubbed the 7/7 tragedy.

Three years later, there have been 7 bomb blasts in a day, again on 7/7 - but this time in Karachi. The blasts followed a bomb blast in Islamabad yesterday which left over 20 people dead, including 15 police personnel.

The series of bomb blasts in Karachi has led to a wave of fear in the city. There are panicked phone calls to loved ones, chaos in hospitals and major traffic jams in the city. Two children have been reportedly injured in the blast, and over 45 people have been admitted to various hospitals.

All this, despite the fact that Karachi had been placed on a high-security alert. I personally spoke to the Inspector General of Karachi Babar Khattak in the morning who assured me that there was heavy police deployment in the city. His reassuring words have gone up in smoke.

I have no words left to describe this tragedy, and how it affects Karachiites. We have been through this so many times, that it has ceased to faze us - instead, it reminds us each time that we are paying the price for someone else’s war.

A country is supposed to feel like home, where one feels safe and secure, and most important of all, free.

However, more so than before, Pakistanis are increasingly facing rising levels of insecurity and blood pressure.

There is currently yet another military operation going on in the tribal areas, in an attempt to establish, yet again, the writ of the state. Baitullah Mehsud, the head of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan says they might strike in the provinces of Punjab and Sindh next if the operation continues. The fragile coalition government in the country is on the verge of collapsing if the judges’ issue is not solved soon. And to top it all off, petrol and diesel prices have been raised once again in the country, making it next to impossible for the masses to survive.

There are solutions for the plethora of problems this country is facing. They may not be easy, and they may take some time to solve, but at the end of the day, they are problems created by the forces that have ruled over this country for the past thirty years or so.

It is time for our political and military leaders to put their egos aside, admit their mistakes and fix them. For if they do not do so, and soon, they might just be looking at the end of the state of Pakistan.

Today marks the 55th birth anniversary of slain PPP leader Benazir Bhutto, whose assassination in December last year left the world shocked.

How do we remember Benazir? As the young girl who was not allowed to be present at her father’s funeral, and then spent years in jail and then exile? The sister, who saw two of her brothers killed in mysterious circumstances? The daughter, whose mother now suffers from Alzheimer’s after having suffered the loss of two sons and a husband? As the charismatic politician, who dazzled the media and world leaders with her eloquence, and the masses with her fiery speeches and promises? As the woman who broke down in tears after returning to her homeland after nine years in exile? As the embattled leader, who resorted to US and UK sponsored deals to return to the country without the shadow of corruption charges hanging over her head? Or maybe as the brave woman, who was assassinated in front of hundreds of people?

On her 55th birthday, there are many things one can say about Benazir, both bitter and beautiful. But despite it all, one thing is for sure: Pakistan will never give birth to such a leader again.

Happy Birthday Ms. Bhutto.

Militants in Pakistan executed a woman after accusing her of being a spy for the U.S. and a prostitute, and said others would face the same fate, a government official and villagers said on Wednesday.

(Reuters)

As I have mentioned before, vigilante justice has become a matter of routine in the country. And in an area as volatile as the tribal areas of Pakistan, where women are deprived of their basic rights and are treated in some areas as second class citizens, the news report mentioned above points to a larger problem. Women are frequently accused of having committed adultery [illegal in Pakistan by law], and are stoned to death, all under the guise of jirga justice.

While this is the first time a woman has been beheaded for having been accused of being a spy, in all probability, she was killed for some unproven crime that she did not commit. And in a country like Pakistan, where women are deprived of access to basic facilities like justice, education and health care, stories like the one above come as no surprise to those Pakistanis who have now gotten used to hearing such stories.

What is required is an overhaul of the system, starting from education, especially in the rural areas of the country, including the tribal regions. Not only that, the state authorities must mete out harsh punishments to those who commit such heinous crimes. Unless it is not drummed into our society as a whole that women have equal rights and status in Pakistan, incidents like these will continue to occur, and unfortunately, they will continue to occur unchecked.