Musharaf
played his cards pretty well during the Afghan war winning support
throughout the world and in fact becoming the darling of the
western world, especially America. America needed Musharaf's
cooperation to make it easier for it to bombard Afghanistan; on
the other hand Musharaf could not afford to be on the wrong side
of a super power that was smelling blood. Ever since the
Afghan war, there has been a policy of 'you scratch my and back
I'll scratch yours'. With America on his side Musharaf
enjoyed world-wide acceptance. His firm stance on the
corruption carried out by past governments bound the western
nations in supporting, promoting and funding an authoritarian
setup.
Well Musharaf played the 'joker' by presenting his amendments.
Appointing himself as an all powerful president for the next five
years has lead to international outrage. Even America,
Musharaf's greatest ally has criticised his amendments as
appointing himself as president for five years renders the coming
election to nothing less than a mockery. With the forth
coming elected parliament having no authority to change, alter or
reject Musharaf's amendments, it will be nothing more than a dummy
parliament. The NSC will be an unelected institution having
more authority than any elected individual or institution.
Thus Musharaf has gone too far with his autocratic and
totalitarian designs, which has left him alone, once again, in the
international community.
Musharaf finds him self with almost all parties opposing him
except for those who he has managed to push into the 'kings
party'. Many parties were sick of the old guard and were
willing to support Musharaf as the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)
of Imran Khan and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) of Dr
Tahir-ul-Qadri strongly supported his policies. Rather than
sticking to these newly emerging clean parties who seemed to have
public backing and support, Musharaf preferred the old guard as
they were easier to manipulate. As a result these parties
have parted ways with Musharaf and have more or less moved into
the opposition. With corruption being rampant in the
nineties, there was not a shortage of politicians with whom
Musharaf could make a deal with; gaining their allegiance in
return for a 'let off' from NAB.
With reports of a grand opposition alliance to be announced
shortly after the scrutiny process, things cannot be any worse for
Musharaf. His one time staunch ally, the Pakistan Awami
Tehreek (PAT) seems to be the back bone in the move to form a
grand opposition alliance aimed at stopping Musharaf in his
tracks. The PAT senior vice chairman Agha Murtaza Poya has
been reported by several English dailies to have revealed the
component parties for the proposed grand opposition alliance to be
PPP, PML(N), PAT, and MMA. Well this is another
interesting theory, which has come to light during the past months
but till now nothing has materialised. Such an alliance
seems to be the only effective chance of the political parties
opposed to Musharaf, getting their own way. It does seem to be a
life line for the beleaguered political parties who have been
harassed by the regime in every manner possible. |
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About
Writer:
Mr. Jawed Iqbal, is an independent writer and a
political analyst. His articles appear in printed and
electronic media of Pakistan
eMail : JAWEDS_WORLD@HOTMAIL.COM |
There are also persistent rumours
flying around that segments of the army and the ISI have turned
against Musharaf due to his policies on Afghanistan and Kashmir.
This of course can explain the reported assassination
attempts made on Musharaf during the past couple of months.
Well the question is that can a dictator who has lost the support
of the west and America, with most political parties planning
against him, survive. The fate of past rulers of Pakistan
who have tried to illegally and unconstitutionally pro-long their
stay in office, will not be encouraging for Musharaf. As
they were deposed by one way or another, be it assassination,
disqualification or coup d'état.
With all parties convinced of pre-poll rigging and an artificial
election, the above mentioned methods may be the only way of
removing a dictator. The only way Musharaf can get out of
this mess is to hold totally fair elections, with absolute
impartiality on part of the government from now on in. Well
one should not really be jumping the gun regarding elections as
many political leaders and analysts believe the October elections
will not take place. Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri has said publicly
that if the government is not sure of a victory for the 'kings
party' it will postpone the elections. So many uncertainties
in the current electoral and political process are surely a risk
to national security but what can done about it? With
Musharaf being second to no one but God himself, nothing short of
a miracle can change things for the better.
This
article published in;
Local Media
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Musharaf cornered from all
sides