Rumbling in the legislative jungle

The year's most intriguing political face-off has taken another complicated twist. The protagonists, the chief justice of Pakistan's supreme court, Iftikhar Chaudhry and the country's de facto leader, General Pervez Musharraf, have clashed repeatedly over the country's political future. Now, after last week's imposition of martial law, Musharraf has created a perverse ideological situation - where sidelining the man who has done most to uphold democratic principles in Pakistan has become the best solution for the country.

Musharraf has attempted to silence his nemesis before. In the spring, Chaudhry investigated the role played by Musharraf's prime minister in the sale of a state-owned steel mill for a suspiciously low price. Fearing a scandal, Musharraf filed some rather insubstantial misconduct charges against the justice. In the absence of a credible political opposition, Chaudhry became a folk hero for the anti-Musharraf brigade, who formed an unlikely alliance with the country's lawyers, for whom Chaudhry became a symbol for their threatened independence. Widespread protests forced Musharraf into an embarrassing climbdown.

Since his reinstatement in September, Chaudhry has dogged the general's every move; he opposed the Musharraf's deportation of Nawaz Sharif; took a close interest in handling of terrorists by the intelligence services and investigated the legality of Musharraf becoming president. Chaudhry believed that by standing as a presidential candidate whilst still head of the army, Musharraf had abused the constitution. Knowing the court had the authority to overturn his election victory, the general sacked Chaudhry and his supreme court allies days before their ruling. In doing so, Musharraf again showed disdain for democratic political debate, but has opened up the best feasible route out of the crisis.

The new court is packed with yes-men who are sure to endorse Musharraf's presidential bid. This will allow him to resign as head of the army, removing the court's biggest objection to his presidency. Once he has assumed that role, he will be free to hold legislative elections in January. By following these steps he will give the Pakistani people the chance to elect their own government and appease his Western allies who were so alarmed at the switch to emergency rule.

Should Musharraf follow these steps (and Pakistan's short but chaotic political history exists to remind us that nothing is straightforward), the creation of a studier democracy will also be to the credit of his great rival. Chaudhry's dogged determination to hold the general to account has caused widespread unrest (and tangentially cost many lives) but has reinvigorated the country's politics. If Pakistan's population head to the polls in free and fair elections at the beginning of next year, the rumble of 2007 should go down as a worthy tie.