The New Nation - Internet Edition

Maswood Alam Khan

The process of our cognitive impression, a part of our genetic behavior, is based on what we see, what we hear, what we smell, what we taste---and what we read in newspapers and what we view in audiovisual media like televisions and the internets.

Whenever an impression is registered in our mind, a thread is immediately tagged with it; a thread that may take the shape or form of a symbol, a color, a song or even a fragrance. So, whenever we listen to a song threads relating the song and the accompanying experiences retrieve a sequence of past events from thousands of our separate memory shelves inside our brains and our mind travels back to ruminate over our old reminiscences.

Therefore, when we talk about Awami League the symbol 'boat' appears in our mind and 'a sheaf of paddy' waves at us when we hear about Bangladesh Nationalist Party. Whenever we read any news about Ethiopia pictures of hungry and emaciated people flash up in our minds and whenever we hear about a head of the government of Pakistan we are prone to visualize Ayub Khan, Yahia Khan, etc. in their khaki fatigues.

Governance of Pakistan for the last sixty-one years has been dictated by the country's army chiefs, halftime onstage and the rest offstage mostly based on their own versions of militarized democracy. The present democratically elected civilian government of Pakistan may be just an interlude between two military rules: one rule by General Musharraf that just ended on Monday, August 18 and the other, which may be in the offing, by a future General who has perhaps been watching the stage performance from the wings.

Coalition leaders, the vanguards of the PPP and the PML-N, who were always at daggers drawn, had for about nine years forgotten their old mutual rivalry for the interest of opposing their one common enemy General Musharraf, whose demise had been inevitable since August 7th, when the coalition leaders said they would impeach him.

Now that the General has departed the scene both the political parties have already started brooding over their old fetid sores and scores to settle. How the Pakistan government now deals with the General's succession---and whether it leads to a power struggle---is a looming question.

Pakistan, already weakened by Musharraf's mishandling of political, moral, religious, economic, diplomatic, military, and nuclear issues, may again be poised to plunge into deeper crises----crises that make military leaders in Pakistan caress their mustaches in the expectation of opportune moments to swoop in for a new phase of military rule.

Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape---more known by their acronym "SERE"---is a crucial program each and every soldier must learn during their training as a major focus, an integral part of war preparedness of an army.

A military trainer evaluates his soldiers' ability to participate in a war not only on their nerves of steel, but also on their SERE dexterity---a vital skill an escapee or an evader must use in an attempt to depart a battlefield in order to return to friendly lines when the chance to penetrate into enemy lines is slim or when the probability of being trapped by an enemy in a pincer movement is high.

So, in the event of staging a coup d'état military strategists before drawing a blueprint of ousting a civilian government first of all map out an elaborate diagram on how to evade and escape in case their plans are bungled. Without an escape route made easy and ready no military official is supposed to undertake an attack: any attack, whether it is an assault on the enemy line or a putsch to remove a civilian government.

General Musharraf of Pakistan perhaps did not draw an escape diagram nine years back as he ostensibly did not have any plan to remove the civilian government of Pakistan; rather his military colleagues extremely loyal to him had rejected the then Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's order 'to dismiss their respected chief General Musharraf'.

Soldiers spontaneously moved into positions around important government installations in Islamabad well before the general had returned to the country from a visit to Sri Lanka during the October 1999 coup. After a decade of inept, corrupt civilian rule, many Pakistanis welcomed the overthrow of the then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

"An army chief had thus become the state chief"---a traditional way of changing the government of Pakistan people the world over have been taking for granted for the last five decades.

Whether the exit door General Musharraf used on August 18 to leave his presidential office was diagramed in advance or not is not yet clear. But, there should not be any doubt in anybody's mind that General Musharraf, the former army chief and a key ally of USA in its campaign against terrorism, still has a few allies in the West. General Musharraf who once said that his khaki uniform was like his "second skin" may not be unpopular among those in army garrisons who were once commanded by him and who may still have some filial respects towards their former chief.

Soldiers of Pakistan army, including those who are presently guarding the former army chief-turned-president in his private residence, however, are well aware how valiantly General Musharraf fought during the 1965 war with India and how babyishly he wept after learning that ninety thousand Pak soldiers had surrendered to Indian Army on the day Bangladesh was liberated in 1971.

Like in any country of the subcontinent the spirit of camaraderie among soldiers was and will always be a firewall protecting a serving or a retired general, out of harm's way. No General, retired or active, was ever tried in a civil court of law in Pakistan and the possibility of trying him seems unlikely now that PPP is already in favor of not disturbing the General who intends to spend his twilight years at his luxurious home in the quiet suburbs of Islamabad.

Musharraf is intensely despised by Islamist militant groups like al-Qaeda and is widely unpopular among ordinary Pakistanis mainly for his sycophantic role to please USA by suppressing and oppressing the terrorists unleashed by Osama bin Laden inside Pakistan and its border areas.

After nuclear tests were carried out in 1998, during the Sharif government, the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) imposed economic sanctions on Pakistan. When Musharraf came to power in the coup d'état the following year Pakistan was expelled from the Commonwealth.

With Pakistan economy getting inextricably compounded with problems many experts that time claimed Pakistan was already a failed state, as it was close to bankruptcy and investor confidence was at an all-time low.

But, after Musharraf promised support in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden, international sanctions were lifted and Pakistan started regaining its lost strength. It was for Musharraf's stand against terrorists that the US government plunked down more than US$ 11 billion into Pakistan, though mostly for its military.

Musharraf was also widely credited with seeking peace with India. While lasting solution to the core dispute over Kashmir remains elusive, his dialogues with Indian counterparts dramatically reduced the chance of a cataclysmic future conflicts.

With inflation running at 25 per cent and the economy a shambles the question now for Pakistan is whether the departure of the president---who unlike most Pakistani politicians has never been accused of large-scale corruptions---will bring more stability to the country. It will be a major test for the governing alliance which has discredited itself in recent months by in-fighting and squabbling.

There is an advantage in a military rule a civilian government in a developing country however democratic will never enjoy: roars of guns. Of course, there is no denying the truth that people's power is supreme and no roaring gun can scare them, but only in cases where the majority of people are educated and people's representatives are honest and patriotic and the press which moulds public opinion are unbiased in the truest senses of all the terminologies: educated, honest, patriotic and unbiased.

Paradoxically, educated people, honest and patriotic political leaders and unbiased press are not quite palpable in countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Mauritania where gun-toting khaki-fatigued forces play by their own rules and whims and are at the liberty of redefining political terminologies like democracy and franchise.

In a country like Pakistan people are politically very voracious and they are trigger-happy in following the agitated crowds chasing after a ruler portrayed as unpopular in the press. Getting carried away emotionally they set fire to state properties to steam off their anger and frustrations not realizing that their actions are self-destructive.

They will chant slogans for Islam and democracy at the top of their voice and will not hesitate to shed bloods in the process. But, democracy to the same people will mean far worse than autocracy whenever a bad economy hits their stomachs, no matter if their hardship is an inescapable resultant of any global mishap not under the control of their own government. Political as well as military leaders eagerly and hilariously wait for such moments of mass hunger pangs to capitalize on to serve their own individual agendas.

Democracy will not flower in Pakistan unless there is a visionary like a Mahathir of Malaysia is at the helm to captain the nation. Only a visionary, no matter whether s/he is a civilian politician or a general-turned-statesman, can ensure that the majority of people are educated and their representatives in the parliament are honest and patriotic and the press people who mould public opinion are unbiased with a view to preparing solid democratic foundations where the citizenry will never cower behind walls or under tables hearing the roars of guns fired from army garrisons.