Déjà vu
The Sway of Generals

The cancellation of elections by both General Zia ul Haq and General Pervez Musharraf was followed up by the tightening of military control, including a crackdown on political parties and strict media censorship that added up to de facto martial law, comments Aparna Pande

  There were widespread protests and demonstrations. It looked like things were going out of control and the army stepped in. The Chief of Army Staff announced that the army did not want to stay in power for long but sought only to restore order and allow a return to democracy. Sounds familiar in the context of Pakistan?
   Taking over power in a coup in 1977 General Zia ul Haq claimed that he had stepped in to ‘save’ the country from civil war, economic ruin and corrupt politicians. He assured the nation that he had no personal political ambitions and pledged to hold new elections within 90 days. Then he postponed elections on the ground that a ‘process of accountability’ had to be completed, which might take six months or longer.
   In 1999 General Pervez Musharraf claimed that he was taking over because ‘our economy has crumbled, our credibility is lost, state institutions lie demolished; provincial disharmony has caused cracks in the federation, and people who were once brothers are now at each other’s throat.’
   Both Zia and Musharraf claimed that the armed forces ‘have no intention to stay in charge any longer than is absolutely necessary to pave the way for true democracy to flourish in Pakistan.’ The latter promised to hold free and fair elections in December 2007-January 2008 but imposed martial law on 3 November 2007 saying that Pakistan’s sovereignty was at stake with growing extremism and that ‘inaction at this moment is suicide for Pakistan.’
   General Zia overthrew a democratically elected popular leader, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Bhutto faced charges of corruption and rigging of elections, but to the masses he was ‘their leader’, someone who spoke their language and made them feel, for the first time in Pakistan’s political history, that they had a say in government. Growing mass protests and demonstrations at meetings held by Bhutto’s wife and daughter impelled Zia to hang Bhutto on 4 April 1979.
   General Musharraf overthrew democratically elected Nawaz Sharif in October 1999. Sharif faced charges of corruption, autocratic rule, and a foreign policy failure over the Kargil war. Musharraf, working out an agreement with the Saudi government, sent Sharif into exile.
   In a speech on 16 October 1979 Zia imposed martial law and postponed the elections, saying that ‘The main need of this country is an Islamic, democratic and stable government for which elections for the sake of elections have no meaning. The elections must yield positive results and from positive results I mean that the country should get a government which, while adhering to the ideology of Pakistan, should be able to guarantee stability at least for some time so that the country can be put on the road to progress.’
  General Musharraf’s government negotiated an undertaking with the PPP (Pakistan People’s Party), now led by Benazir Bhutto, that in return for a political amnesty to all politicians and a return to democracy the PPP would support his becoming president if he gave up his uniform.
   While imposing martial law and postponing the elections Musharraf said that ‘a situation has thus arisen where the government of the country cannot be carried on in accordance with the Constitution and as the Constitution provides no solution for this situation, there is no way out except through emergent and extraordinary measures.’ He said the emergency was meant to ‘preserve the democratic transition that I initiated eight years back.’
   In both cases the cancellation of elections was accompanied by a tightening of military control, crackdown on political parties, strict censorship of all forms of media, and martial law in effect. General Zia followed this with an Islamisation drive. General Musharraf, instead, is talking about the problems of extremism and radicalism.


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