Pakistan: Asif Ali Zardari sworn in as 14th president

Sunday saw Asif Ali Zardari take office as Pakistan’s 14th president, following a stunning return the day before when he was resoundingly elected to serve as the nation’s sole civilian president for a second time.

At a modest but official ceremony held at Aiwan-e-Sadr, the Presidential Palace, 68-year-old Mr. Zardari was administered the oath by Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa.

After Dr. Arif Alvi’s five-year term ended in September 2023, he served in office for five months before being replaced by Mr. Zardari.

Along with other senior army and civilian officials and diplomats, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, General Asim Munir, Chief of Army Staff, and General Sahir Shamshad Mirza, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, attended the swearing-in ceremony.

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Attending the oath-taking event was Mr. Alvi, the departing president and a prominent figure in the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, which is led by the imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan.

Present on the occasion were former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, his son, Aseefa and Bakhtawar Bhutto Zardari, and other family members.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has congratulated Mr Zardari on his election as the president for the second term.

In a message, Shehbaz Sharif said that the Senate, National Assembly and elected members of all the four provincial assemblies have expressed their confidence in Zardari. He said that the Zardari will be a symbol of the strength of the federation.

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This is the second time that Mr Zardari has won the presidency, a record for any civilian. Earlier he served as the 11th president of Pakistan from 2008 to 2013 and is one of the four democratically elected presidents to have completed their five-year constitutional term.

He has been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan since August 2018.

Co-chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), Mr Zardari was the joint candidate of the ruling alliance and was elected on Saturday after he defeated Mahmood Khan Achakzai, a candidate backed by jailed former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) by a huge margin.

Born in 1955, Mr Zardari was brought up and educated in Karachi. He was married to Pakistan’s former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s daughter, Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated in December 2007.

“Congratulations to all democrats on the swearing in of Asif Ali Zardari as the President of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, God willing, Asif Ali Zardari will use all his powers as the President of Pakistan for the political, democratic and constitutional stability of the country and the country will be on the journey of development. Will proceed,” the party posted on its social media X handle.

The office of the president is a ceremonial post, and he acts on the advice of the prime minister. But Zardari is expected to play a larger role as his PPP is a key partner of the coalition government.

While the chief ministers of Punjab and Sindh attended the ceremony, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa chief minister Ali Amin Gandapur, who belongs to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party was not present.

Incidentally, almost 12 years ago, Qazi Faez Isa, who was then the Balochistan High Court’s Chief Justice and headed a Commission that investigated what was known as the Memogate scandal for over five months and exonerated Mr Zardari from any direct involvement in the memo scandal.

On Saturday, Mr Zardari secured 411 electoral votes in Parliament and all four provincial assemblies with the backing of allied parties - mainly Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) against Achakzai’s 181 electoral votes.

An electoral college comprising lawmakers belonging to federal and provincial assemblies votes for the president.

After the partition in 1947, Pakistan’s first president was Iskandar Mirza who took office on March 23, 1956 after the first constitution was adopted and the country became a republic. Before that the country was led by the governor generals who ruled under the amended India Act of 1935.

In an editorial, the Dawn newspaper noted that Mr Zardari was the country’s first civilian president to complete his tenure and his election as president has made him the first Pakistani to hold that office twice.

“It is evident that his style of politics has kept currency in the corridors of power despite the many sociopolitical changes this country has seen since the last time he occupied the presidency. It is, undoubtedly, a remarkable comeback orchestrated by a sharp political mind,” the editorial commented.

Both Shehbaz and Mr Zardari have returned to their previous roles now and sit at the pinnacle of their political careers, an editorial in The Express Tribune newspaper said.

“Earlier, Mr Zardari was dubbed as an accidental beneficiary entering the presidency. However, this time around, he ensured that the timely wheeling and dealing between the two major political parties - his PPP and the PML-N – paved the way for his return to the presidency,” it commented.

In line with Mr Zardari’s easy win in the vote involving legislators from Parliament and four provincial assemblies, there are hopes that the duo’s rule will mark a new phase of stability in the country," it added.

(With agency inputs)