Apll be asked in hundreds of thousands of homes in the country. They will also be asked by the world outside. Pakistan today is a country in which the outside world has a vital interest and a vital stake. It is a country much different from the one General Pervez Musharraf came back to after that fateful flight from Colombo on October 12, 1999.
Then Pakistan was a forgotten piece of geography ruled by a series of corrupt politicians who had ruined the economy and given the country a bad name. If Pakistan received any notice at all outside its borders, it was with stories about its ugly features. Western correspondents, stationed in India but with Pakistan included in their beat, found interest only in such things as child labour, honour killings of women, sectarian violence, Islamic fundamentalism, drug mafias, boundless corruption. There seemed little to cheer about the place.
And then September 11 happened. With remarkable alacrity, President Musharraf repositioned his country and himself in America’s war against global terrorism. The war was led by George W. Bush, the American president who was predisposed to think about the world along binary lines — good and evil, right and wrong, friend and foe. On September 20, nine days after the terrorists struck the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon near Washington, President Bush issued a clear call to the world — “either you are with us or against us”. Pakistan told Washington that it was clearly on its side.
For six months, Pakistan and its president were at the centre of the world stage, participating vigorously in the campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Al Qaeda network. That Pakistan had once given full support to the Taliban was not forgotten by the western governments and the western press. That there were a significant number of people in Pakistan who continued to remain sympathetic to the Taliban was a fact of which the West was often reminded of by events such as the barbarous murder of journalist Daniel Pearl and the bombing of a church in Islamabad. Pakistan’s once support of the Taliban and the continuing sympathy towards the now deposed regime notwithstanding, Islamabad continued to be valued as an ally. Will this continue as Pakistan begins to move towards some kind of a democratic order? That process began with the April 30 referendum.
In the past few days I have followed closely the debate on the pros and cons of the referendum. Most of the comments in the domestic and foreign press were negative in both tone and content. Most of them dealt with only one aspect of the matter: Whether General Musharraf, by calling a referendum had bypassed the Constitution and the established political process. Most commentators have maintained that the president should have stuck to the letter and spirit of the Supreme Court’s order asking him to hold elections by October 12, 2002, three years after the assumption of political control by him and his military colleagues. It is said that by conducting a referendum he has forestalled the return of democracy. There was no reason why this should have been done.
The verdict issued by the western press was that General Musharraf, in spite of all his promises, had behaved as was expected of military autocrats. In an editorial titled “Pakistan’s Perpetual President,” The New York Times was not willing to accept General Musharraf’s often repeated claim that the exercise in political development in which he was engaged will bring Pakistan a truly democratic form of government. “In two and a half years since he seized power in a military coup, Gen. Pervez Musharraf has frequently pledged to return Pakistan to democratic rule. But General Musharraf deludes himself if he thinks the presidential referendum he has scheduled at the end of the month is an affirmation of democracy,” declared the newspaper. It advised the American government to adopt a less benign approach towards Pakistan’s military leader. “The Bush administration has mildly questioned the legitimacy of the referendum. It should more forcefully tell General Musharraf that his plan can only undermine the respect he has earned throughout the world since September 11,” it wrote.
The Washington Post was a little more accommodating of the compulsions of the Pakistani situation. It recognized that “Pakistan’s political parties have a bad record. Successive governments led by Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif in the 1990s were flagrantly corrupt and had poor relations with the United States”. But the newspaper worried that “a likely outcome of the referendum initiative is a weakened leader who will be mired in power struggles with the civilian politicians elected in October”. Accordingly, advised the newspaper, “if he is really required for Pakistan, Mr. Musharraf should be able to work within a legitimate democratic system. If he is unwilling to do that, continued US support for his role would be a mistake.”
Some of those writing for the British press were even more shrill in their criticism of President Musharraf and his referendum. “The referendum is his insurance policy,” wrote Peter Preston for The Guardian. “Now he has to legitimize his standing just in case the autumn polls turn against him and produce some awkward and truly elected representatives.” But, advised Preston, the Pakistani president should not be encouraged to go on this route. “Armies, perhaps require what Musharraf calls a ‘unity of command’. But the bloated Pakistan army isn’t the answer to any of Pakistan’s most urgent questions. Musharraf is our short-term friend and long-term enemy.”
Was all this criticism warranted? Was it correct to assume that General Musharraf had succumbed to the same kind of temptation that had kept several of his military predecessors engaged in politics long after the welcome mat had been pulled out from under them? Or, was it right to grant the general the benefit of the doubt by recognizing that Pakistan was caught in a difficult bind. It had to develop a system of governance that would meet a number of objectives. It should sustain the confidence of the people, it should allow leaders to act quickly in the larger interest of the country, it should have the respect of the international community, it should have the flexibility to adapt quickly to the changes occurring within Pakistan, in its neighbourhood and in the world.
Nations define their strategic interests by gauging what is best for the majority of their citizens. That is why democracy is a better system of governance than any other. If it works well — and even as The Washington Post editorial recognized it did not for Pakistan — those who lead will generally follow what the majority of the citizenry wants. The citizens mostly leave these judgments to the leaders they place in office. There are, of course, exceptions such as Switzerland where most important decisions require the direct participation of the people. But large countries with complex make-ups cannot afford the luxury of waiting upon direct instructions from the people before decisions get taken. That is why leaders are expected to seek the general approval of the citizenry through periodic elections.
In between general elections, leaders have a fairly wide room for manoeuvre. Successful leaders are those who are able to read complex situations, identify the more relevant variables, and find the solutions that will serve the greatest interest for the largest number of people within a citizenry. What is it that Pakistan faces today that will require a great deal of careful handling and why this would not be possible if General Musharraf and his colleagues had let the country’s future be determined by yet another parliamentary election? After all, Pakistan went through four such elections — in 1988, 1990, 1993 and 1997 — and they produced neither democracy nor stability. Why should another one in October 2002 be any different? General Musharraf’s detractors must answer this question before heaping so much criticism on him.
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