WITH the country still reeling from the weekend’s sectarian violence and urgent questions being asked about the government’s will and capacity to lead from the front, Interior Minister Nisar Ali Khan decided yesterday to change the subject. Perhaps not surprising — if still very depressing — the chosen object of the diversion was even less surprising: Pervez Musharraf. The government, the interior minister announced, is ready to initiate treason proceedings against the former military dictator. So why now? The government will predictably hide behind the fig leaf of having had to wait for the mandated investigation to be completed first. It may even be privately argued that as Mr Musharraf slowly and methodically disentangled himself from the legal thicket he had been ensnared in, now was the time to revisit the treason issue lest the former dictator leave the country never to come back. Inevitably, few of the explanations proffered will be accepted at face value, there being an old habit of governments to change the subject when under pressure.

This paper has consistently held that Mr Musharraf should face trial for his October 1999 coup. Unhappily, that is the one issue no one in government or the judiciary seems to want to push. Instead, the focus has stayed on the November 2007 emergency declared by Mr Musharraf and a plethora of other charges that satisfy various narrow political considerations. Even now, there will be plenty of doubt that the proceedings will be seen through to their conclusion with a guilty verdict handed down after the special prosecutor and defence are heard by the special tribunal that will hear the case. After all, in none of the other cases that Mr Musharraf has been embroiled in has there been much movement beyond giving the former army chief bail. Still, having upped the ante so publicly now, there will be some pressure on the government and the higher judiciary to deliver at least something. Quite what that can be short of a conviction is difficult to predict at this moment.

Perhaps the template will be the government’s handling of the weekend’s violence and national criticism heaped on the government. Some bluster and bombast at press conferences, some solemn pledges in parliament, some attempt to be seen to be doing something — and then simply wait for the next crisis to divert the already short national attention span. It is surely not a good way to lead a country or run a government. But as the problems pile up and the fear grows, true leadership seems to be the last thing on the minds of the country’s leaders.