August 19, 2008	Tuesday	Sha’aban 16, 1429

RAWALPINDI, Aug 18: Authorities deployed extra security for Gen (retired) Pervez Musharraf when he returned to his residence in this garrison town after resigning as president on Monday.

Troops lined the route and army helicopters kept a watch from the above as he drove from the Aiwan-i-Sadr in Islamabad to what used to be the Army House in Rawalpindi before it was renamed as the Presidential Lodge earlier this month.

Meanwhile some 150 extra police guards were posted outside the Lodge where army was responsible for the security inside the building and the police outside.

A senior police officer told Dawn that the extra security was mounted as a precaution against public anger bursting out against the down and out president.

Gen Musharraf had moved into the formerly Army House in 1998 after he was appointed Chief of the Army Staff.

Even after seizing power in a military coup in October 1999, and assuming the office of president he did not move to the Aiwan-i-Sadr. Like all the previous military rulers of Pakistan he preferred the safety of the Army House.

Gen Musharraf even moved his presidential office from Islamabad to his residence after surviving several attempts on his life.

When, or if, the plain Mr Musharraf would move into the farm house he had bought in the Chak Shahzad suburbs of Islamabad some years back is not known.

But it would certainly depend on security the government is willing to provide him.

As President Gen Musharraf's security was a headache for the Punjab police and the public which had to suffer blocked traffic whenever he moved out of his residence.

Roads leading to his residence were barred to public and certain parts of the vast Ayub National Park in the vicinity were sealed off after several rockets were discovered there.