Re: Hearing of Presidential Petitions Completed - SC Verdict Soon
http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/oct-2007/7/columns5.php
Luck smiles on Musharraf
Ikramullah
The much awaited crucial Supreme Court verdict on the petitions by presidential candidates Makhdoom Amin Fahim and Justice (Retd) Wajihuddin, seeking stay order of the presidential elections, was finally delivered on Friday. The short order states “having heard the learned counsel for the parties at some length, it is unanimously resolved and directed that the election process already commenced shall continue as per the schedule notified by the Chief Election Commissioner. But the final notification of the election of the returned candidate shall not be issued till the final decisions of these petitions. The main petitions shall be set down for hearing on October 17.” In compliance of the above verdict; the presidential election has been held as scheduled on October 6, 2007. This marks an historic end to the president’s eight years rule beginning from October 12, 1999. Much has happened in Pakistan – on the regional and global level. In Pakistan we are at the thresh hold of a new era where after 8 years, the Pakistan army will soon have a whole time Chief of Army Staff and General Musharraf will soon finally doff his uniform, assuming the office of the president for the next five years as President Pervez Musharraf.
Looking at the fate of Pakistan’s past military rulers, Musharraf has so far emerged as the luckiest. He survived more than one attempt on his life when all the odds were against him. On March 9, 2007 whether ill-advised or otherwise, Musharraf chose to shoot at his own foot. His star that seemed to desert him on July 20, 2007 but the general has managed to get out of his darkest moments during his rule. Most people thought it was only a question of time before the engine sustaining Musharraf’s authority collapses. But the commando again survived against the heaviest odds. The final assault came from a united opposition in the form of the Charter of Democracy. The combination of two main stream political parties, joined by the religious parties under the banner of the MMA was, indeed, a lethal weapon that the ruling political alliance could not counter and defeat, by itself in the next general elections. Had the psychological threat combined with the street agitation sustained itself for a few weeks, Musharraf’s re-election for his next term would have posed a tough match not easy for him to win without the backing of the armed forces and the ruling alliance of PML-Q, MQM and PPP. At this critical juncture nature again smiled at Musharraf. The lethal threat posed by the united assault by Benazir and Nawaz Sharif evaporated under internal and external factors coming into play, turning the scales in the president’s favour. However, as the tenure of the president as well as the life of the assemblies approached to an end, fresh troubles for Musharraf emerged in the shape of the legal and constitutional petitions filed in the Supreme Court on the issue of his holding dual offices – that of the president and COAS. At the same time the shrewd political insight of Benazir prompted her to seize the moment for the realisation of her dreams of coming into power again. A combination of the moderate forces under Musharraf and Benazir were the need of the hour in the crucial war against terrorism. Efforts in this direction had been undertaken quite sometime back but came to the forefront in the shape of Liddle Hart’s strategy of indirect approach during the past few weeks.
While the petitions in the Supreme Court seeking to block Musharraf’s eligibility to contest the presidential elections on one count or the other reached within hours of the D Day of October 6, there was hectic political activity both in Islamabad and London in the respective camps of the government and the PPP. This has finally ended in a dramatic manner in the shape of promulgation of the “National Reconciliation order” (NRO 2007). The ordinance gives amnesty to all politicians who were booked in various corruption charges during the political era from January 1, 1985 to October 12, 1999, the date when Musharraf took over ousting Nawaz Sharif. It can be safely predicted that if the old mindset of the government and the opposition persists Pakistan shall remain ridden with one crisis or the other. The one point agenda of the opposition focusing on the ousting of Musharraf has not paid off and is not likely to yield quick results in the near future with a major political party like the PPP joining hands with the president aimed at facilitating the establishment of a democratic, Islamic, social welfare state.