Musharraf’s gone: So what’s next?

| PAKISTAN LEDGER | August 18th, 2008 | Moin Ansari | The dictator is gone. Long Live the new Dictators. There was celebration in the streets!

Hardly had the tears of joy dried, that the nation was faced with the inevitable dissolution of the coalition government. Why were Pakistanis surprised? Mr. Zardari has a track record.

The biggest task for the new government will be to manage the expectations of the populace. The cheering crowds expect the prices of food items to return to 1999 levels, the elimination of food and fuel shortage, an end to US bombing of FATA and an end to terror. Most of this will not happen. As the pressure builds, the coalition will come under tremendous pressure.

The PPPP and PMLN participate in elections, but are not known for their democratic norms and parliamentarian ways. In the first term of Benazir Bhutto she hardly passed any major legislation and did almost nothing to ameliorate the lot of the women and the poor. The Hadood ordinance survived here two stints in power and has not been repealed in the past 100 days.

The PMLN in their last term did not use the parliament or even the cabinet to discuss issues. Most of the problems were resolve din “Abbajees kitchen cabinet” between the father and his two sons and a few close confidantes. The treasury was looted and the foreign exchange earnings of normal hard working people seized. At the tail end of his government Mr. Nawaz Sharif had left only $200 million.

The PPP-PLMN alliance government of 2008: The Foreign exchange vaults have fallen from $17 Billion to $8 Billion. Inflation, partly due to the rising oil prices but also due to bad or lack of governance is spiraling out of control. There are food, fuel and electricity shortages.

The worst criticism is that both the leaders, Mr. Sharif and Mr. Zardari are always out in London and Dubai.

The co-chairman Mr. Bilawal Bhtto arrived in Pakistan and had to admit to a reporter “I do not speak Urdu”.

The dictator is gone. Long Live the new Dictators.

The resignation

President Pervez Musharraf announced his resignation on TV

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-pakistan19-2008aug19,0,5947849.story

The reaction

 

 

The exit of President Pervez Musharraf from the political stage in Pakistan opens up an era of both possibilities and risks for the country.

The alliance that came to power after the elections in February will now really have to get to grips with its biggest challenges - a possible economic meltdown and the growing militant threat in the north-western tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

If they fail, it may spell the end of the hopes of Pakistan ever becoming a successful democracy.

The key for failure or success lies with the two largest parties in the alliance, the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).

In the six months since the elections, they have spent much of their energy arguing about what to do with President Musharraf.

In fact, the alliance came close to a split in May when they could not agree then on whether to impeach Mr Musharraf and whether to try to reinstate the judges he had sacked in November 2007.

So with Mr Musharraf out of the way, will things get better?

Can they put their need to collaborate above the narrow interests of each party?

Strains

The PPP emerged as the largest party in February elections but failed to win a simple majority in the parliament.

Lawyers celebrate outside the presidential palace in Islamabad

Many analysts believe it wants to expand its influence in the PML-N’s power base in the province of Punjab, where more than half of the country’s voters live.

A couple of recent PPP moves in this direction have caused strains in the alliance.

But the reinstatement of the judges could be a bigger problem.

The issue has been central to PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif’s recent politics, and is generally believed to have added to his increased popularity in the post-election period.

But the PPP is said to be inclined to keep some of the judges, including deposed Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, out of a restoration deal, a condition which Mr Sharif has so far resisted.

Many say PPP leader Asif Zardari fears that Justice Chaudhry may outlaw a legal arrangement under which corruption cases against him were withdrawn, paving the way for his return to the country last year.

Fractured country

The more optimistic view is that Mr Sharif and Mr Zardari have compelling reasons to bury their differences.

Ordinary Pakistanis are desperate for economic improvement

The political future of both leaders lies in their ability to deliver in political as well as economic terms, a task which no single party can perform on its own, given the fractured state of the country.

In the coming days, the two men will come under increasing pressure to tackle severe food and fuel inflation, falling reserves, a yawning trade gap and an overall slowdown in economic growth.

In addition, they will continue to face questions over their proposed legal reforms, and the fate of hundreds of ‘missing’ persons - most of them political activists allegedly being held incommunicado by the intelligence agencies.

And there’s another big reason why the two men cannot afford to fail.

Both have been victims of military coups in the past, and it is only through joint action that they can hope to survive another attempt by Pakistan’s powerful military to keep a civilian government under its influence.

It is widely thought here that success on both counts will require the political as well as economic backing of Western powers, notably the US.

This will also bring Western pressure on the country’s army to deal with the militants more effectively, analysts say.

And that leads on to another long-standing problem that democratic governments face in Pakistan.

The military question

How can this coalition make sure that the military conducts its operations in the way the civilian government wants, rather than in the way the military wants?

Will the military do the bidding of Pakistan’s civilian government?

The military’s present campaign in the Bajaur tribal region is its first credible assault on a suspected al-Qaeda stronghold in several years, but questions remain over how far it will go.

A similar operation in South Waziristan in the winter of 2007 was called off just when most analysts expected a final triumph over the militant groups based there.

Similarly, the government will have to redefine Pakistan’s relations with India in the light of what it sees to be the country’s national security interests, rather than letting the military dictate the agenda.

In the past, both the PPP and the PML-N have worked for peace with India.

In late 1980s, the PPP government’s alleged attempt to help India overcome the Sikh insurgency in the Indian Punjab brought accusations of a sell-out against then prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, from a group of ex-army generals.

The last attempt in 1998 by Nawaz Sharif, then prime minister, to normalise relations with India was derailed when the Pakistani army infiltrated the Kargil region in Kashmir.

Mr Sharif says that Mr Musharraf, then army chief, ordered the operation without informing his government.

So the challenges facing the new government are great indeed, and no one is underestimating the risks of failure.

 

Questions linger for post-Musharraf Pakistan

Updated Mon. Aug. 18 2008 2:49 PM ET Bill Doskoch, CTV.ca News

The resignation of Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf has left his country slightly more democratic but its politics just as chaotic, say Pakistan watchers.

“It’s a thunderclap both for Pakistan and its foreign supporters,” Eric Margolis told CTV Newsnet on Monday.

Musharraf, the former army chief who took power in a 1999 coup, stepped down in response to the near-certain threat of impeachment by the country’s parliament. 

The two main parties in Pakistan’s parliament are the Pakistan Peoples’ Party (PPP), led by the Bhutto family, and the Pakistan Muslim League-N, led by former prime minister Nawaz Sharif. The PPP dominated in the February elections.

However, Margolis said there are very real questions that affect the nuclear-armed South Asian nation’s stability:

• Can the coalition between the two parties hold?
• Who will become president?
• What powers will the new president hold?

Sharif vs. the Bhuttos

A major question will be how well the civilian government can continue to work together, Margolis said.

Sharif is a former prime minister of Pakistan deposed by Musharraf. He and the Bhuttos — Asif Ali Zardari and Bilawal Bhutto, husband and son respectively of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto — are political rivals.

“The one thing the two had in common was their opposition to Musharraf,” Louis Delvoie — a senior fellow at Queens University’s Centre for International Relations and a one-time Canadian high commissioner to Pakistan — told CTV.ca.

There is some talk that Zardari might wish to seek the presidency, but only if it remains as a powerful post and not downgraded into a figurehead one, Margolis said.

Sharif’s party has said it could live with Zardari as president, but only if the position is made ceremonial.

Margolis said Zardari, a minister under Benazir Bhutto, has some grave allegations of corruption hanging over him.  “A lot of Pakistanis feel he is not fit to be president or prime minister of Pakistan until these allegations are finally cleared up,” he said, adding Sharif has also been dogged by corruption allegations.

Tariq Amin-Khan, a professor at Toronto’s Ryerson University, told CTV.ca that another key issue is the restoration of the nine supreme court judges sacked by Musharraf as he attempted to cling to power last fall. 

“I think that is a big stumbling block,” he said, noting that for whatever reason, the PPP hasn’t pushed the restoration forward even though it said that it would.

Musharraf’s departure will put an end to what Amin-Khan called “the blame game” — both Musharraf and the parties pointing fingers at each other for political paralysis in the country — that has hurt Pakistan.

“Now that he’s gone, they will be accountable to what’s happening,” he said.

Terrorism, Afghanistan

There are also questions about how developments in Pakistan will affect neighbouring Afghanistan, where Canada has 2,500 troops as part of a NATO coalition trying to stabilize the elected government of President Hamid Karzai.

“There’s going to be a lot of change now in Pakistan’s policies, both internally and towards Afghanistan,” Margolis said, noting the two main coalition parties favour reducing Pakistan’s role in the so-called war on terror.

Pakistan is a key front and has received billions in military aid from the United States since September 2001. Its restive tribal regions are home to domestic Islamist militants and provide sanctuary to Taliban fighters from Afghanistan — and to al Qaeda, the global Islamist terror group.

Margolis said Musharraf, who publicly opposed foreign troops operating on his country’s soil, tacitly gave the U.S. the green light to carry out missile strikes on al Qaeda targets inside Pakistan — along with some ground raids.

The new government would oppose such moves, but the U.S. has made it clear it won’t seek permission if it has a chance to take out a high-value al Qaeda target, he said.

Domestically, Margolis said the war on terror is really “a fight against Pashtun tribesmen along the North West Frontier of Pakistan who are supportive of their Pashtun first cousins in Afghanistan.”

The new civilian government has moved towards scaling back its military operations in the tribal areas and attempted to reach political settlements with militants. However, that effort is fraying in some areas such as the Swat Valley, where clashes between militants and government forces have left more than 100 dead in recent weeks.

Margolis said Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan’s top military leader, is in step with the civilian leadership.

Delvoie said that the new government is basically following Musharraf’s lead on dealing with the tribal areas conflict.

Afghanistan has complained that easing up on the battle against militants in Pakistan simply frees up more fighters to cross the porous border into its territory.

While Canada and Afghanistan might complain about the border, sealing it would be impossible, Delvoie said.

Amin-Khan said that a military solution in the tribal areas isn’t possible.

To win support of the populace there, the government needs to do a better job of providing basic governance and to alleviate the high levels of poverty, he said.

While it doesn’t affect Canadian interests as directly, relations between India and Pakistan — particularly with respects to Kashmir — are key foreign policy issues in Pakistan. Several wars have been fought with India over Kashmir since partition in 1947.

“It think with all of its other troubles (Islamist militants in the tribal areas, secessionists in Baluchistan), the last thing the government would want to do is stir the pot in Kashmir,” Delvoie said.

However, Kashmir has been known to bubble up on its own, he said.

From New Delhi, CTV’s South Asia Bureau Chief Paul Workman told Newsnet that India’s news media has been absolutely obsessed by the Musharraf story and what it might mean to their country.

Margolis said even if things seriously deteriorate in Pakistan in the coming months, its military has very secure control over the country’s nuclear arsenal.

“There is absolutely no risk of the bomb falling into radicals’ hands — unless the army were to split apart into different factions. But for the time being, that’s not happening,” he said.