Some had feared - while others had hoped - that General Pervez Musharraf’s
coup of October 12, 1999, would bring the revolution of Kemal Ataturk to a
Pakistan and wrest the country from the iron grip of mullahs. But years
later a definitive truth has emerged. Like the other insecure governments
before it, both military and civilian, the present regime also has a
single point agenda - to stay in power at all costs. It therefore does
whatever it must and Pakistan falls further from any prospect of acquiring
modern values, and of building and strengthening democratic institutions.

The requirements for survival of the present regime are clear: on the one
hand the Army leadership knows that its critical dependence upon the West
requires that it be perceived abroad as a liberal regime pitted against
radical Islamists. But, on the other hand, in actual fact, to preserve
and extend its grip on power, it must preserve the status quo.

The staged conflicts between General Musharraf and the mullahs are
therefore a regular part of Pakistani politics. This September, nearly
seven years later, the religious parties needed no demonstration of muscle
power for winning two major victories in less than a fortnight; just a few
noisy threats sufficed. From experience they knew that the Pakistan Army
and its sagacious leader - of “enlightened moderation” fame - would stick
to their predictable pattern of dealing with Islamists. In a nutshell:
provoke a fight, get the excitement going, let diplomatic missions in
Islamabad prepare their briefs and CNN and BBC get their clips - and then
beat a retreat. At the end of it all the mullahs would get what they want,
but so would the General.

Examples abound. On 21^st April 2000, General Musharraf announced a new
administrative procedure for registration of cases under the Blasphemy
Law. This law, under which the minimum penalty is death, has frequently
been used to harass personal and political opponents. To reduce such
occurrences, Musharraf’s modified procedure would have required the local
district magistrate’s approval for registration of a blasphemy case. It
would have been an improvement, albeit a modest one. But 25 days later -
on the 16^th of May 2000 - under the watchful glare of the mullahs,
Musharraf hastily climbed down: "As it was the unanimous demand of the
ulema, mashaikh and the people, therefore, I have decided to do away with
the procedural change in the registration of FIR under the Blasphemy Law".

Another example. In October 2004, as a new system for issuing machine
readable passports was being installed, Musharraf’s government declared
that henceforth it would not be necessary for passport holders to specify
their religion. Expectedly this was denounced by the Islamic parties as a
grand conspiracy aimed at secularizing Pakistan and destroying its Islamic
character. But even before the mullahs actually took to the streets, the
government lost nerve and the volte-face was announced on 24 March, 2005. Information Minister Sheikh Rashid said the decision to revive the
religion column was made else, "Qadianis and apostates would be able to
pose as Muslims and perform pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia".

But even these climb downs - significant as they are - are less dramatic
than the astonishing recent retreat over reforming the Hudood Ordinance, a
grotesque imposition of General Zia-ul-Haq’s government unparalleled both
for its cruelty and irrationality. Enacted into the law in 1979, it was
conceived as part of a more comprehensive process for converting Pakistan
into a theocracy governed by Sharia laws. These laws prescribe death by
stoning for married Muslims who are found guilty of extra-marital sex (for
unmarried couples or non-Muslims, the penalty is 100 lashes). The law is
exact in stating how the death penalty is to be administered: "Such of the
witnesses who deposed against the convict as may be available shall start
stoning him and, while stoning is being carried on, he may be shot dead,
whereupon stoning and shooting shall be stopped".

Rape is still more problematic. A woman who fails to prove that she has
been raped is automatically charged with fornication and adultery. Under
the Hudood Law, she is considered guilty unless she can prove her
innocence. Proof of innocence requires that the rape victim must produce
"at least four Muslim adult male witnesses, about whom the Court is
satisfied" who saw the actual act of penetration. Inability to do so may
result in her being jailed, or perhaps even sentenced to death for
adultery.

President and Chief of Army Staff General Musharraf, and his Citibank
Prime Minister, Shaukat Aziz, proposed amending the Hudood Ordinance. They sent a draft for parliamentary discussion in early September, 2006. As
expected, it outraged the fundamentalists of the MMA, the main Islamic
parliamentary opposition. MMA members tore up copies of the proposed
amendments on the floor of the National Assembly and threatened to resign
en masse. The government cowered abjectly and withdrew.

Musharraf’s government has proved no more enlightened, or more moderate or more resolute and behaved no differently from the more than half a dozen
civilian administrations, including two terms of Benazir Bhutto as Prime
Minister and several “technocrat” regimes. None made a serious effort to
confront or reform these laws.

But the pattern is broader then deference to the mullahs. General
Musharraf has been willing to use the iron fist in other circumstances.
Two examples stand out: Waziristan and Balochistan. Each offers
instruction.

In 2002, presumably on Washington’s instructions, the Pakistan Army
established military bases in South Waziristan which had become a refuge
for Taliban and Al Qaeda fleeing Afghanistan. It unleashed artillery and
US-supplied Cobra gunships. By 2005 heavy fighting had spread to North
Waziristan and the army was bogged down.

The generals, safely removed from combat areas, and busy in building their
personal financial empires, ascribed the resistance to "a few hundred
foreign militants and terrorists". But the Army was taking losses (how
serious is suggested by the fact that casualty figures were not revealed),
soldiers rarely ventured out from their forts, morale collapsed as junior
officers wondered why they were being asked to attack their ideological
comrades - the Taliban - at American instructions. Reportedly, local
clerics refused to conduct funeral prayers for soldiers killed in action.

In 2004, the army made peace with the militants in South Waziristan. It
conceded the territory to them, which had made the militants immensely
stronger. A similar “peace treaty” had been signed on 1 September 2006 in
the town of Miramshah, in North Waziristan, now firmly in the grip of the
Pakistani Taliban.

The Miramshah treaty met all demands made by the militants: the release of
all jailed militants; dismantling of army checkpoints; return of seized
weapons and vehicles; the right of the Taliban to display weapons (except
heavy weapons); and residence rights for fellow fighters from other
Islamic countries. As for “foreign militants” who Musharraf had blamed
exclusively for the resistance, the militants were nonchalant: we will let
you know if we find any! The financial compensation demanded by the
Taliban for loss of property and life has not been revealed, but some
officials have remarked that it is “astronomical”. In turn they promised
to cease their attacks on civil and military installations, and give the
army a safe passage out.

While the army has extricated itself, the locals have been left to pay the
price. The militants have closed girl’s schools and are enforcing harsh
Sharia laws in all of Waziristan, both North and South. Barbers have been
told “you shave, you die”. Taliban vigilante groups patrol the streets of
Miramshah. They check such things as the length of beards, whether the
“shalwars” are worn at an appropriate height above the ankles, and
attendance of individuals in the mosques.

And then there is Balochistan. Eight years ago when the army seized power,
there was no visible separatist movement in Balochistan, which makes
nearly 44% of Pakistan’s land mass and is the repository of its gas and
oil. Now there is a full blown insurgency built upon Baloch grievances,
most of which arise from a perception of being ruled from Islamabad and of
being denied a fair share of the benefits of the natural resources
extracted from their land.

The army has spurned negotiations. Force is the only answer: "They won’t
know what hit them", boasted Musharraf, after threatening to crush the
insurgency. The Army has used everything it can, including its American
supplied F-16 jet fighters. The crisis worsened when the charismatic
80-year old Baloch chieftain and former governor of Balochistan, Nawab
Akbar Khan Bugti, was killed by army bombs. Musharraf outraged the Baloch
by calling it “a great victory”. Reconciliation in Balochistan now seems,
at best, a distant dream.

Musharraf and his generals are determined to stay in power. They will
protect the source of their power - the army. They will accommodate those
they must - the Americans. They will pander to the mullahs. They will
crush those who threaten their power and privilege, and ignore the rest.
No price is too high for them. They are the reason Pakistan fails.