Pakistan has been in turmoil since 2007. With deadly incidents striking the country from time to time, "bombing," "assassination" and "state of emergency" have become the defining themes of its political life. The persistent chaos, in the final analysis, is attributable to Pakistan's elections.

Various opposition forces attempted to take this opportunity to create trouble and force President Pervez Musharraf to step down. Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists who had fled to Pakistan frequently collaborated with local terrorist organizations to launch attacks on Western countries' facilities and personnel in Pakistan and Pakistan's government installations, fueling the country's instability. Western countries exerted pressure on Musharraf, demanding that he return power to the people.

Musharraf has been in office for more than nine years since 1999. He was elected Pakistan's civilian president in September 2007 for another five-year term. The Pakistan People's Party (PPP) won the National Assembly election in February. It then set about nominating a candidate for prime minister and forming a coalition government to share state power with Musharraf. On March 24, former National Assembly Speaker Yousuf Raza Gillani was elected Pakistan's new prime minister.

The PPP is the largest political party in Pakistan. It enjoys widespread public support in the country, especially in the south. It owns the most seats in the National Assembly, the lower house of Pakistan's parliament, where it wields greater influence than any other political party. The PPP's solidarity and power were greatly enhanced when its former Chairperson, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who had lived in exile, returned to Pakistan in September 2007. At the end of the year, Bhutto was assassinated in a suicide attack. Her assassination did not weaken the PPP, but helped it to gain even more public support.

After Bhutto's death, her son Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and widower Asif Ali Zardari were made co-chairs of the PPP. According to the election results announced by the Election Commission of Pakistan, the PPP, the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) and the former ruling party Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid) won 120, 90 and 51 seats, respectively, in the 342-seat National Assembly. Zardari and Nawaz Sharif, the leader of the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz), agreed that they would form a coalition government. Bilawal, a 20-year-old currently studying in Britain, cannot serve as prime minister. Zardari also is ineligible to compete for the post of prime minister. Because he had been held in prison and faced legal charges, he is not a member of the National Assembly. He cannot become prime minister until he is elected to the National Assembly in the by-elections in May. So, the PPP needed a temporary prime minister to head the interim government.

For one time, the PPP's Vice Chairman Makhdoom Amin Fahim, who served as deputy chairman of the party for eight years while Bhutto was in exile, was considered the most likely candidate. Days after the National Assembly election, Zardari announced that Fahim was a unanimous PPP candidate for prime minister. But he had to back down as many members of the PPP and its ally Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) criticized Fahim for being close to Musharraf. Fahim did not give up his efforts to run for the premiership. Had the PPP nominated a candidate he disliked, he could have broken with the party. The severe discord within the PPP was evidenced by the fact that it took the party a long time to finalize its candidate for prime minister.

The nomination of Gillani was clearly aimed at paving the way for Zardari's takeover. Gillani, 53, is the PPP's vice chairman. He is regarded as a loyal follower of the Bhutto family.

Working together

Forging cooperation with the PPP is a double-edged sword for Musharraf. As a veteran political party, the PPP has gathered a large number of elites and is experienced in governing the country. Its late leader, Benazir Bhutto, served as Pakistan's prime minister for two terms in the 1990s. The inclusion of PPP officials in the cabinet will not only make Musharraf's governing team more capable and prestigious, but also help sustain Pakistan's rapid economic growth. But Musharraf will find it difficult to address potential conflicts between his party, the Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid) and the PPP. If he fails to deal with them properly, the political situation in Pakistan may spin out of control.

Musharraf is bound to get himself well prepared for the cooperation. He will maintain a firm grip on crucial powers such as defense and diplomacy, leaving the PPP little room for action. If he runs into a conflict with the PPP's leaders before Pakistan's situation stabilizes, Musharraf is likely to take the moral high ground and try to prolong the cooperation by narrowing their differences. He recently said that he would give full support to the government, no matter who leads it. He said he hoped the new government could maintain peace and Pakistan's rapid economic and social development. He also said he hoped that it would devote as much effort to fighting terrorism and extremism.

Judging from the present trends, Musharraf will be able to put Pakistan under his control but will face mounting difficulty in doing so. Whether he can get along well and cooperate efficiently with the PPP prime minister has yet to be seen. For all the uncertainty, both Musharraf and the PPP have to confront a common challenge in promoting the balanced development of Pakistani society and eradicating terrorism at its source.

Since the September 11 terrorist attacks, extremist forces and secessionist organizations have reemerged in Pakistan. Colluding with Al Qaeda and the Taliban, they have launched slews of terrorist attacks against Musharraf, posing the most immediate challenge to the president. Despite severe government crackdowns, these organizations have continued to expand. Pakistan's unbalanced social development is a prime reason.

Economic issue

Given its economic stagnation and rapid population growth, Pakistan's per-capita national income declined in real terms in the 1990s. The country's economy recovered after the September 11 terrorist attacks as Western countries abolished their sanctions against Pakistan and provided it assistance. But because the country failed to achieve balanced social development, various social problems have arisen.

Pakistan's recent economic growth has not delivered benefits to ordinary people. Instead, inflation has worsened their living standards and widened the gap between the rich and the poor. Because of the high unemployment rate, a large number of young people live in poverty. They have grown increasingly hostile toward society and the government. The development between Pakistan's urban and rural areas is highly uneven. Rural residents, who account for more than 70 percent of the country's total population, are left out of its economic recovery, making the rural areas breeding grounds for religious extremist forces. Pakistan's economic achievements are most evident in the central province of Punjab and the southern city of Karachi. The Central Government locates most of its development projects in these areas, while neglecting other parts of the country.

As a result of the unbalanced regional development, officials and residents in some regions bear a grudge against the government, leading to the resurrection of secessionism. Under slogans such as "pursuing social justice" and "promoting regional interests," religious extremist forces and secessionist organizations recruit members from impoverished young Pakistanis. Committed to undermining Musharraf, these forces will cause severe havoc to Pakistani society if they are not effectively checked.

In the next five years, the Pakistani Government will attach equal importance to economic growth and balanced social development, promote social reconciliation, eliminate the breeding grounds that foster religious extremist forces and secessionist organizations and seek to consolidate its power. While continuing to emphasize national defense, the government will make economic development its top priority. For example, it has formulated the Vision 2030 strategic policy paper. It also has underlined efficiency and conservation, concentrated on developing infrastructure and large enterprises and privatized a large number of state-owned enterprises to inject life into them. It will pursue reforms in the executive and judicial sectors and in taxation. Given these steps, Pakistan's economy is projected to maintain its rapid growth in the few years to come.

At the same time, the Pakistani Government will put poverty reduction and employment promotion at the top of its agenda so that more ordinary people can benefit from the country's economic development. In 2006, Musharraf launched the Rozgar Pakistan scheme, under which the National Bank of Pakistan would provide small loans to create new job opportunities in communications services and the retail sector.

The author is a researcher at the China Institute of International Studies