I remember discussing with a group of friends in Chakwal General Zia's promise to hold elections in 90 days and relinquish power. This was in September 1977. Most of us were of the opinion that having made such a pledge before the whole world, Zia would have to stick to it.

One Syed Anwar Shah, then patwari of Chakwal, also happened to be with us. He quietly listened to our discourse and when we had finished he said that when the patwariship of Chakwal, a lucrative assignment, fell vacant he and another person joined the race to fill it. Both of them pulled what strings they could, from the commissioner in Rawalpindi to the Board of Revenue in Lahore. Ultimately the matter was settled in Anwar Shah's favour by the Chief Secretary of Punjab.

The question which Patwari Anwar Shah put to us was this: if he and his competitor could go to such lengths to secure a gift as relatively small as that of the patwarkhana of Chakwal, were we in our senses to think that anyone holding the nation's destiny in his hands would quit so easily and retire to his farm in the countryside?

When I remember this it does not take General Pervez Musharraf's pronounced lack of clarity on the question of a time-frame for the restoration of democracy to tell me that he will not be in a hurry to go away. If renunciation and self-abnegation are not qualities associated with the patwaris of Chakwal, how much less so with patriarchs in the Latin American sense of the word?

Whether we like it or not, General Musharraf, to the roll of muffled drums, now joins the pantheon of Pakistan's patriarchs, a hall of fame where shrouded in gloom sit the uneasy busts of his predecessors, generals Ayub, Yahya and Zia. To his good fortune, he joins this select company with an easy conscience, his mind not troubled with the weight of any dark conspiracy. He is in a position to say that what has come to pass he did not seek. It was forced upon him by events set in motion by the amazing stupidity of that ironmonger and his clan who were placed over our heads by a mocking destiny. It will be some time before this excuse starts wearing thin.

But the question of greater interest to the somewhat bemused citizens of the Islamic Republic is now not so much how these events were enacted as how the future is likely to unfold. Will new ground be broken or, as in a nightmare, are we doomed to revisit the haunts of the past?

General Musharraf's optimism notwithstanding, the sad-looking and tired crew recruited thus far for his ship - Pirzada, Attiya Enayatullah et al - holds little promise that we are about to sail into the sun. As for the past, it too is hardly reassuring.

Military interventions in Pakistan have always followed a certain genetic code. In the beginning they exude a sense of vitality and vigour. Public expectations are high and there is talk of reform in the air. Politicians as a class are reviled and stories of their ineptitude and corruption are laid bare. Then as time passes military rule mutates into a hybrid democracy with a section of the political class becoming willing tools of the new dispensation. This was the pattern both under Ayub and Zia. Yahya who came in between had not the time for it because he was busy presiding over the break-up of Pakistan.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and then, a political generation later, Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif were products of the mutant and distorted democracy growing out of military rule. Bhutto senior was a product of the Ayub regime; Nawaz Sharif and his Muslim League the most outstanding political products of the Zia regime. In blaming these knights for their failures, and there is no doubt their failures have been conspicuous and enormous, the army cannot absolve itself of a large share of the blame.

When it plays the role of genetic and biological scientist it cannot disclaim responsibility for the mutant species issuing forth from its laboratories. One of the more memorable lines spoken by General Musharraf since seizing power is that he would not like to see a return to any "sham" democracy. Does he not realize that military rule, especially when prolonged, can deliver only a "sham" democracy? If a sapling is deliberately stunted, how can it grow into a healthy plant?

Now once again Pakistan finds itself in the throes of another political experiment presided over by yet another military figure who is asking his countrymen to suspend disbelief, take everything on trust and pay no heed to the past. Where this experiment might lead or what political species it ends up producing we do not know.

What is certain is that across the political spectrum there is a great vacuum created by the comprehensive manner in which the political class and its two fountainheads, Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, have discredited themselves. A plague upon both your houses: this is the public attitude towards them. Into this vacuum has marched the army but far from helping to clear the mist, its action has added to the sum of national disquiet. The reason: despite the rhetoric we are hearing and the brave face being put on events, the army too seems vague about how to cut through the thicket of confusion besetting the nation's path. More than any other kind of bankruptcy, this is a bankruptcy of ideas.

Examples of confusion: APP quotes General Musharraf as saying (1) "once we analyze the situation at the grassroots level, districts would be made autonomous bodies... (controlling) their own destiny, education, medical, communication and whatever they want;" and (2) "the days of the British era are gone when the government functionaries were put there to control and subjugate the people... the people are supreme, the government functionaries must be made subservient to (them)."

Resonant words but steeped in simplicity. How can he be sure that once the situation at the grass-roots' level is analyzed, the automatic conclusion would be that districts should be made "autonomous" in the manner he speaks of? Why not wait for the analysis before jumping the gun? There is a crying need to improve the administration of justice (the bedrock of a modern state) and to make the writ of the state more effective so that laws are not only passed but also enforced. But first there is a need to understand the problem. How would an armyman react if a civilian knowing nothing of military matters were to talk of corps and divisional re-organization?

Much the same holds true for the perfunctory reference to the British era. In Pakistan blaming colonialism for all our ills is the last refuge of ignorance. Why do we forget that the codification of laws, the rule of law and the institutionalization of merit as the basis of advancement and preferment were ideas brought into the subcontinent by the British, ideas largely alien to our own history and which we have done our best to roll back. Any serious attempt at administrative reform will have to cut through the corruption and mayhem of the last 50 years and start from where the British left off. A soldier at least should be able to understand this point better because to the extent that the army, organized totally on British lines, has retained its cohesion and professionalism, it has done so by jealously guarding and not doing away with the ethos and traditions of the old British Indian army.

Another example of confusion: the Punjab governor paying a surprise visit to a thana and being appalled by conditions obtaining there. In the first flush of enthusiasm high-ranking officials are invariably tempted to act as school, hospital and thana inspectors. They forget that while such inspections are useful, of far greater importance is the need for institutional reform - a need postponed for the last 52 years.

Tailpiece: In a nation where self-promotion has been developed into an art form, one of the greatest self-promoters of all must be newly-appointed envoy to the UK, Akbar S. Ahmed. The picture of him in the papers talking to the Chief Executive is a classic. While the CE looks slightly bewildered, Akbar Ahmed is caught in pontificating mode. The question is: was Akbar Ahmed already known to the CE or did someone recommend him? Either way one must hand it to the high commissioner-designate for a job well done.