What Went Wrong?


Written by S.G. Jilanee • Cover Stories • July 2008

The smiles and frowns of fortune on Pervez Musharraf recall the story of Yahya Barmaki, as recorded in al Baramka - the chronicles of the Barmaki clan. When he was in luck, Caliph Hārūn ar-Rashīd showered bounties on him and appointed his son, Ja’far, as prime minister. A little more than a year ago, Pervez Musharraf seemed to be at the apogee of his career; today he appears at the perigee. What went wrong?

^{Julius Köckert's 1864 painting depicts Harun al-Rashid receiving Charlemagne the Magnificent}

In those days, Yahya recounts, one day as he was sailing in a boat, his diamond ring slipped from his finger into the water. He never hoped to get it back. Then, after a few days, he brought home a fish from the fresh catch. As the fish was cut open, lo and behold, there was his ring sitting in its belly!

But when luck frowned, the Caliph hanged his son and threw him into prison. During his imprisonment, Yahya got some meat after a long time and tried to cook himself a meal. But when it was cooked and he was removing the pot from the fire, it slipped from his hand and the contents fell into the ashes.

Back to Musharraf. Drunk with the victories in his ‘bouts’ with Leghari, Sajjad Ali Shah, Gen. Karamat and Adm. Fasih Bokhari, Nawaz Sharif, tried suddenly to remove the last thorn in the way of his becoming the amirul momeneen, whom all subjects must give their total allegiance. He had filled the presidency with an old personal employee and the judiciary with his yes-men. With his protégé Ziauddin Butt as COAS, the picture would be complete.

But the method Sharif adopted to get rid of Musharraf was crude and utterly cowardly. Instead of serving him the marching order in a proper form, he sacked Musharraf, when the latter was in mid-air, flying back home from a conference in Colombo.

As Capt. Afaq Rizvi writes in Dawn; Nawaz Sharif “gave orders that his (Musharraf’s) aircraft should not be allowed to land at any airport in Pakistan. The Karachi runway was blocked with bulldozers and fire engines. The orders were conveyed to the captain of PIA flight PK-805 when he was less than 10 minutes from Karachi. Most of his fuel had been used up. With serious fuel constraints he could only fly to Ahmadabad or might barely make it to Bombay: both Indian airports.

“As the incumbent Chief of General Staff, Gen Musharraf was the one man who was privy to every single detail of our secret defences: conventional and nuclear; missiles and warheads. After the recent Kargil affair he was also the one man whom the Indian Intelligence would have loved to lay their hand on.”

Nawaz Sharif had risked even the lives of the passengers and crew to achieve his purpose, because the only alternative to flying into India would be to crash land inside Pakistan.

That was the moment when Fortune smiled on Musharraf. In a bloodless coup Sharif was overthrown. And, when he took over, most people agreed that his hands had been literally forced. Some even sympathised with the predicament he had had to encounter.

Musharraf also acted with discretion. Instead of declaring martial law, which has been the norm for every general since 1958, he assumed the innocuous as well as innovative title of Chief Executive. And he did not court martial Capt. Safdar, Nawaz Sharif’s son-in-law, either.

When he appeared with a pair of Pekingese under his arms, and his wife, bareheaded in public, he became the instant star of the liberal lobby at home and in the West as a moderate. He further reinforced this image with the slogan of ‘enlightened moderation,’ which became so popular in the West as to be quoted with approval in the media and some books.

Musharraf gave more freedom to the media than it had ever enjoyed even during the democratic regimes. His statement that the economy had reached the bottom so the only way for it was to rise, was received as a message of hope by people who had felt cheated by Nawaz Sharif’s empty slogan of ”breaking the kashkol.” And, above all, he demonstrated his respect for constitutionality by obtaining the Supreme Court’s approval for his every act. Even for the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution that restored the unpopular Article 58 (2) B and introduced others equally unpopular, he adopted the democratic course of channelling it through the parliament.

All these measures fitted into his claim for introducing ‘true democracy.’ Even his reforms in the district administration which he called ‘grass roots democracy’ did not encounter any serious opposition.

The first slip he made was in 2001, in the aftermath of 9/11. When Secretary of Colin Powell phoned Musharraf and, particularly, when Richard (Rhinoceros) Armitage, his deputy, threatened to bomb Pakistan into the Stone Age, unless it agreed to toe the line, he got cold feet. Of course there were other compulsions besides. For instance, India was itching to join the fray. So, yielding to US blackmail was the only alternative.

But he could have acted discreetly, suggesting to his interlocutors that prior approval of the parliament was a democratic requirement. The champions of democracy worldwide could not have disagreed with such a proposal.

A national assembly session would have been called. Faced with the grave threat that was looming, the approval would come within minutes. The problem would be solved, with Musharraf’s democratic credentials further reinforced.

Then there was the referendum. Even Pervez Musharraf’s friends question the wisdom of calling the referendum and, when it was called, the imperative for its rigging. Why could it not have been held like the 2008 elections?

Musharraf’s fatal mistake was to let go of Nawaz Sharif. The court had sentenced him. So, why did he intervene and allow a Hariri or the Saudis to poke their nose into the country’s domestic affairs? Many countries, from Saudi Arabia to USA had appealed to Ziaul Haq, at least, to spare ZAB’s life. The option of exile was also offered. But Zia was not swayed.

The president has been squeaky clean. Not even his most avowed enemies dare call his hands soiled. He is the first head of state under whom the legislatures completed their full five-year term and free fair elections were held for the second time in the sixty years of the country’s history. But the fallout of the above two errors washed away most of the plus points. At home he was isolated because of his autocratic posture, while America demanded its pound of flesh from “nearest the heart.” Musharraf handed over about 600 people to America as disclosed by ex-interior minister, Moinuddin Haider at a recent TV talk. At US behest he deployed the army against their own compatriots. The result was mini-insurgency in which more than a thousand troops and many civilians lost their lives.

Musharraf even survived two assassination attempts for his alliance with America. Yet its thirst for Pakistani blood remained ever unquenched.

As luck dipped, Musharraf committed further major mistakes. One was to allowed the Lal Masjid sore to fester until it was too late when he took action. The other was his bout with Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry. Why he did what he did remains an enigma. And to top it all was the imposition of emergency on November 3, 2007. He has reached the very bottom of his luck, denounced as Evil incarnate. Voices that recount his positive services to the country are few. Yet he rejects speculations that he would go into exile or impose 58(2)B and offers his full cooperation to the government. This is what raises the question, “will he rise again?”