LAST year, just about this time, the reverend maulanas of the MMA — led by their two flag-bearers, Maulana Fazlur Rehman and the redoubtable Qazi Hussain Ahmed — came to the regime’s rescue by clambering aboard the wagon of the 17th Amendment and giving constitutional legitimacy to Gen Musharraf’s rule.

The opposition considered this a stab in the back. The maulanas said that they were getting Gen Musharraf to shed his uniform. When the general appeared on national television and pledged to take off his uniform by end 2004, the maulanas looked triumphant, their position seemingly vindicated.

The “President to Hold Another Office Bill” (the legal wizard who gave the bill this name should get a national award) having been signed by the acting president, Muhammadmian Soomro, perhaps the most important achievement he will ever be able to take credit for in his lifetime, Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Qazi Hussain Ahmed look considerably less triumphant. In fact they are having a hard time wiping the embarrassment off their faces.

For years on end there has been a close affinity between General Headquarters and the maulanas, the military using the maulanas and then discarding them when their use was over. Gen Musharraf has dealt with them in the same fashion, leaving them angry and slightly humiliated, the more so because they can do little about this state of affairs.

They are promising a fearsome agitation but we have yet to see what kind of storm they can set off on their own. They are also saying they won’t recognize the president as president after Dec 31, a grave threat but perhaps unlikely to make the president lose much sleep.

Lesser mortals would be embarrassed at having to break a solemn promise made to the nation. But following in the footsteps of Gen Ziaul Haq who made and broke promises at will, we have to hand it to Gen Musharraf for not being embarrassed at all. Commenting on the signing of the bill from distant Sao Paulo which he was visiting at the time, he said it reflected “continuity and stability”.

This year, unless the PPP is careful, it is the PPP’s turn to be given the maulana treatment by Gen Musharraf. The MMA willingly put egg on its face in the name of “saving the system”. The PPP is getting itself into a similar mood in the name of “national reconciliation”.

But even though official spin doctors may milk the reconciliation theme for all it is worth, it is a strange kind of reconciliation we are seeing. Gen Musharraf who, as some sources indicate, already refers to himself as “a man of destiny” — the last temptation of anyone in power — is setting no date on his simultaneous occupancy of the presidency and Army House. From the constitutional trenches Army House has occupied, it is not retreating an inch. Elections are not about to be held in a hurry. Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif are not being invited into the country any time soon. What kind of national reconciliation then are we talking about?

The military have played games before, they’ll play them again. Partners taken for a ride may change, but the golden rule beloved of anyone in authority will still apply: divide and rule. If last December Army House’s one-point agenda was the passage of the 17th Amendment, this December it revolves around the wish not to see the opposition parties united on the uniform issue.

The maulanas were fed a different sop and the PPP is now being tantalized by something else. But the aim remains the same: to tide over short-term difficulties even as long-term Army House strategy — sticking to power whatever it takes and keeping the opposition guessing — remains unaltered.

The pass in which the nation finds itself calls for unity and statesmanship on the part of the opposition parties. After all, could there be anything clearer than the uniform issue? The president gave a pledge he would take it off. He’s gone back on his promise. Doesn’t this call for a united front on this one-point agenda? Isn’t it time the political parties showed wisdom and leadership? What do we want for Pakistan, representative rule or some kind of Egyptian democracy where the president stays in power forever?

While making noises about unity, the political parties are driven by different priorities. The maulanas face a credibility problem and it is only natural for the PPP and the PML-N to wonder whether they can be trusted again. But apart from this, the maulanas, even while smarting at the treatment they’ve received from Gen Musharraf, are keen not to imperil their stake in the present system.

That is why we already see a divide between them and the PPP on a crucial question. Zardari says 2005 will be the year of elections. Maulana Fazlur Rehman agrees, only to add slyly, with a barely-suppressed smile, that it will be the year of local elections.

We must remember also that while the maulanas are staunchly anti-American, or at least their rhetoric is, the PPP and Gen Musharraf are one on the need to follow a pro-American line. Where the two differ is in the PPP’s belief that it is in a better position to deliver a pro-American agenda than Gen Musharraf.

What we are left with then is a prospect clouded with confusion. There may be no hard-and-fast deal between ISI operatives, who really run Army House’s politics, and the PPP, but if talk of reconciliation fills the air, and the PPP, regardless of the noises it makes, goes soft on the uniform issue, we may not have a deal but have something close to a shared understanding.

Remember that Asif Ali Zardari is still on some kind of a reprieve. The cases against him have not been withdrawn. And Benazir Bhutto’s return path to Pakistan has yet to be charted out. It took Army House five years to countenance Zardari’s release on bail. Only someone with knowledge of the occult sciences can predict how long the present process of reconciliation takes, without of course arriving at any conclusion.

This is exactly the way India treats Pakistan: an open-ended peace process played out on lines suiting India but leaving Pakistan increasingly frustrated because on issues of concern to Pakistan there is no tangible progress, let alone any solution.

In any event, what makes Zardari so sure elections will be held next year? Pressure from the White House? Some kind of pressure on the military government that only Zardari can see? Elections will be held in 2005 if the military government is cornered or if the opposition parties can dictate their terms to the government. There are precious few signs of that happening, especially given the dithering on the uniform issue.

Trouble is that in the sauna (hamam) of Pakistani politics everyone is naked. The military leadership has its own interests, best summed up by the term self-perpetuation. The maulanas are victims of contradictory impulses, wanting to preserve their share of the political cake, yet at the same time keen to wipe the stigma of military collaboration off their faces.

The PPP leadership wants to rewrite the past so that no one should be able to point a finger at its performance (or its sins) when it was in power. The PML-N leadership must live with the bitter thought that on present reckoning it is out of the political fray for a number of years, that too because of its own decision to leave the country. The MQM, all too aware of the winds blowing in its favour, is Army House’s only true, from-the-heart collaborator across the length and breadth of the country.

Where does this leave the people of Pakistan? And in which direction should they look for deliverance?