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The writer is a columnist and researcher on development issues
Development Notes
There is no doubt that General Pervez Musharraf and his ardent supporters, who are many among the educated and so-called liberal classes of this country, have won. The world community is all praise for General Musharraf. International Media is going crazy praising
him to the sky. Magazines of international repute like Economist and Newsweek are devoting pages in his praise where people are quoted as calling Musharraf the "second Jinnah". All this is praise for his stand against the extremists in Pakistan who in the
eyes of the west is the predominant breed in this country. General Musharraf is being projected as a daring, revolutionary leader who has risked his life for cleansing the country of this extremist element.
General Musharraf is definitely not oblivious to this praise that is coming his way. He had made clear his intention to stay on after the completion of his three years much earlier, but now his statements are becoming increasingly self-confident and his
assessment of his own performance even more self-congratulatory. "It is just that I am not elected, the essence of a democratic set up is there, I would just put the label of democracy on it, as desired by the west and the rest of the world", he said in his
speech at the Human Development Forum last week.
He also made it very clear that he is envisioning a new form of democracy for this country. "Democracy with checks and balances" that is what he calls it. "The system which is good for some countries cannot be applied constantly at other places," he adds.
Basically, that means that we are going to get yet another distorted version of democracy which will be designed to best serve the interests of the military General of the time.
The problem is that Pakistanis seem to have very strong memory. This is not the first time that a military government is planning to have elections while at the same time continuing to hang on to real power. All military regimes in Pakistan have sooner or
later tried to give their governments a democratic face by having some form of elections, primarily to give their own government more legitimacy. General Ayub Khan and General Ziaul Haq, the former stayed a decade while the latter crossed his tenure by a year,
played with the same idea. A helpless and powerless Prime Minister Junejo, and a silent parliament was the outcome of elections held by General Zia besides creating politicians like Nawaz Sharif, who is now being held responsible for most ills of this country
along with Benazir Bhutto.
But, again we are being told that this military regime will be different and will bring true democracy to this country. Since the very beginning of his takeover General Musharraf has been advocating that he is a firm believer in democracy. Also, he has been
emphasising that democracy is not just about having elections, it is more about how you run the affairs of the country.
Now, if General Musharraf is claiming that his government is really democratic in its working then how can we explain General Musharraf holding umpteen titles? He is the self-appointed Chief Executive Officer, then he became the President, he is also the
Chief of the Army Staff and the list goes on. If the government is really democratic then how come Nawaz Sharif who was projected to be such a big culprit against the whole nation was released without consulting the public or even taking them into confidence
before undertaking that action. Similarly, how come now Admiral Mansur, who was extradited from US for the massive corruption charges against him in defence deals, is now being released with most of his assets intact, because he threatened to reveal names
of other military officials involved in these deals. What form of democracy is this?
The thing is that when a military government becomes too keen on wearing democratic garb, it is basically wasting the nation's time in useless activity. The way the government comes in power matters. There will always be a difference between legitimacy of
a government that is elected and one that is voted in by the people and eventually has to go back to the same people to get reelected than the government which uses the backdoor and takes on the main seat by force. There is simply no point trying to justify
the legitimacy of the government that has to put the constitution in abeyance in order to take charge.
The only justification for such a government is to take drastic reforms for developing the country. But, in case of the present regime, we have not seen any of those drastic reforms. Most of the government's time has gone in justifying its rule and making
claims that it is the most democratic government that this country has ever had. Investments in education and health, which are critical not only for the well-being of the population but also for economic growth, have seen no increase. Even the courage to
take on the extremist elements in the country, something that the country had needed for a long while, came only after India and US forced the government into doing it. One can only hope that all the donor money that is coming to this country now is used for
the right purposes with top priority given to education. But, going by the performance of the government in education so far it will be self-deluding to expect too much.
Meanwhile, the international community with its generous praise for General Musharraf has proven that it does not care what happens to the people of poor countries as long as their own interests get served. When General Musharraf took over as a military
leader Pakistan was chastised by the Commonwealth, President Clinton gave a long speech on PTV on the need to have democracy in his one-day stopover in Pakistan, US imposed some more sanctions on us. But, now because the same military general is serving the
interest of the west, he has become a hero. If these are not double standards than what are?
At one level, it now seems pointless to keep criticising the military government. General Musharraf found a lot of willing supporters among the educated Pakistani civilians after his coup, now he has many admirers in the international community. He is going
to be in power for years and his hold is going to become even stronger with time. Military as an institution intervening in the governance process is going to grow even deeper roots. It seems that those of us arguing for democracy should accept the fate and
rest our case.
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