How real is Musharraf’s real democracy?

hamidm #29 you write ``the only people who can take on the mullahs are the jiyales of the ppp`` I assume you mean the same jiyalas who stormed the supreme court. I dont think so! The medicine would be as bad as the disease.

you write ``if you want democracy in a can maybe we can invite paul bremer `` I told you not to go flying pie-in-the-sky (or bremer-in-the-sky).

mushy is all we have got - and his performance so far: He gets an A in economics (growth rate expected to be 6 percent this year, the second year when finally we have the economy beginning to move, and with a fine economic team that he has put together); he gets and A for relations with India (where he has done a perfect carrot and stick approach to get BJP off its high horse); gets an A for relations with the US; gets a C for fu!cking the elections by tilting them in favor of mullahs and thus helping them avoid their traditional humiliating beating at polls that they received from Pakistani voters. But we have gotten him a good tutor on that, and hopefully he will improve his grades in Democracy 101 as well. (Like all military men, he has a hard time unlearning the stuff he picked up in the Army Messes about how only God and the Generals know what is best for Pakistan, and even God isnt all that great since he has not been through PMA).

mohar #28 I see you have joined Jay Thakeray in providing a running commentary on my views (which I have to periodically correct by telling him to cut and paste what I wrote, at which point he disappears from the board. I wont waste time asking you to do the same and thus prove you to be a liar, since you are just a second rank hindutva compared to Jay. I only talk to your high command of hindutvas). I see have added further insights by also explaining what have shaped my views. All this is no doubt based on detailed research, including interviews with my childhood friends.

They must grow individuals like you in special septic tanks in India. You cant be real.

Pakistan has to develop an institutional mechanism for removing the role and influence of the military from within Pakistani politics. Pakistan has to gradually and progressively, consolidate the supremacy of the parliament as a body of de jure civilian rule. This needs to be done through acts of parliament, which are based on consensual politics of compromises and not on politics of paralysis, as the present opposition seems to be doing. Granted that military rule is awful for Pakistan and it has never really been a boon for Pakistan, the difficult question is not to debate the removal of the military from politics or not or cite its utility or not, but to devise a methodology of removing the military from politics so that its does not cause political dislocations to the system, which ends up harming the process of legitimizing political institutionalism in Pakistan.

The present political system is deeply flawed and the parliamentary democracy in Pakistan is prone to conflict based politics, but it has to learn to develop a style of politics, which is more suited to conflict based resolutions of problems in Pakistani politics. The present parliament, regardless of the dignity or lack of dignity of its birth, must be allowed to finish its tenure and new elections held in 2007. The requirement for Pakistan is not to debate the merits of democracy, but to ensure that the parliament is able to institutionalize its role in Pakistani politics. The real problem in Pakistan is not a lack of democracy but a lack of a viable mode of peacefully transfering power from an incumbent government to an elected goverment. It is this inability of the Pakistani political system, which is exploited as a reason by the military for periodically intervening in politics.

In this sense, the civilian governments have a share of responsibility for undermining democratic institutionalization of Pakistani politics, because they have always resisted the peaceful transfer of power. Even the mostly democratically elected government in the history of Pakistan, the Pakistan People`s Party`s (PPP) rule from 1973 from 1977 was flawed, because it resisted the results of the 1977 elections, which forced a political crisis that ended in the military coup d` etat of July 4, 1977. It was the lack of a peaceful transfer of power to Mujib-ur-Rehman after the election results of 1970, which caused the break up of East and West Pakistan.

Pakistan needs to institutionalize its transfers of power in a peaceful manner and thus, remove the sole criteria for military`s interevention in politics.

Pakistan needs to develop an institutional process of politics and if this means that the present system of flawed governance is allowed to continue, then its must be allowed because Pakistan cannot afford another experimentation in political democracy. The presently flawed system must be allowed to politically evolve and its flaws corrected within an institutional process and not through ad hocism of seeking the military`s removal from politics. The removal of the military from Pakistani politics is the not the sine qua non of democracy and the alpha and omega of democracy in Pakistan lies within the process of institutionalizing intergrity of its political process.

Ciao

#26 by hamidm2
//...then there is tahmed mian who is willing to put up with the fools in khaki as long as they take on the mullahs ....how quickly we forget that the generals created the mullahs and that they are in bed with them...//

Like I said - tahmed mian is the product and benefeciary of Paki Army - he owes his life to the lergesse from that establishment. So he is always going work in support of that establishment - sometimes openly and sometimes from inside a closet ( depending on prevailing situation ). Doing otherwise would actually be `namak-haram` - from his point of view.

See - he knows Paki Army is in bed with mullahs. I mean everybody knows THAT. Mullahs are ruling two states (out of 4 ) in pakistan now all because of army has rigged the election in their favor. Also the central gov`t too is dependent on their support.

And yet - ahmed mian is jumping up and down - singing praises of paki army - how bravely they are is ``taking on`` mullahs.

tahmed,

.......... mushy is not going to take out the mullahs - he is going to appease them by giving in to their demands and institutionalizing their agenda ........ take a look : since he usurped power the people of nwfp and baluchistan have lost cable tv, blasphemy and hadood laws are still on the books, gabriel is on ptv-4 twenty four hours a day and mrs musharraf`s puppies have disappeared - rumour has it they were shot by a firing squad ............

.......... the only people who can take on the mullahs are the jiyales of the ppp, the goons of the pml and the armed thugs emplyed by the anp ............ they kept them in check for many years, didn`t they? ........... oh, but then you would say the reason the army took over was because these guys were breaking each other`s head ........ so what?......... have you never seen pictures of parlimentarians in taiwan, korea, japan, israel and italy acting like a bunch of ruffians?............. by definition, it takes time to build democratic traditions and institutions and you have to go through the process ............. if you want democracy in a can maybe we can invite paul bremer after he is done with his current assignment ................

hamidm #22 I realize that the mullahs are the creation of the military. But the fact is that musharaff (having suddenly seen the light for whatever reason) is now the best bet to clean them out as well. No external army is going to do it because mushy wont let them. And the mullahs are too well armed for civilians to chase them out of Pakistan with sticks. Who else will clean out the mullahs then? The Chowk Armchair Paper Warriors? General ``Frankenstein`` Zia created the mullahs, and General ``Son of Frankenstein`` Mushy has no choice now but to take the mullahs out. You need to be practical, my good humored but pie-in-the-sky friend.

ahmedzai and romair,

............ are you two geniuses saying that pakis are lesser beings than the horrible hindoos who still choose to follow the faith of our ancestors ?............ how did they manage to build a democracy while still running around in half naked in dhotis with little in their stomach ?..............i am sure fauji-brain will jump up and say that we have the feudals to contend with ....... so what about the nizam of hyderabad and all the other rajas and maharajas - were they born democrats?.............

.............an then there is tahmed mian who is willing to put up with the fools in khaki as long as they take on the mullahs ............. mashallah!......... how quickly we forget that the generals created the mullahs and that they are in bed with them ........ who said that bb and ns were not doing as good or better a job at running the economy than the pma trained economists? ......... the general?........ and what exactly has shaukat aziz accomplished ?.............. foreign exchage reserves?............ where did the money come from?..........hint: fe25........... certainly not from increased exports ............ how much more money is cbr collecting?.......... is the stock exchange a respectable institution instead of a den of thieves?............ is ptc, pia, wapda, railways any better than they were under ns ?........... has the fauji foundaton been audited ?...................

.............. as long as people like you go on making excuses for the goons in uniform, there is no hope ..............

Blog from Baghdad
News you do not otherwise get.

malik: You say General Musharaff is a whore for siding with the US in rounding up the uzbeks, chechens, arabs, and local mullahs who think that Pakistan is their fiefdom where they can walk around waving their guns to keep Pakistani civilians scared.

I say you dont have a clue about what you are talking about.

Here is a thought: Maybe you ought to give up your US passport and go join the mullahs to fight our jawans (they are all whores, remember), and maybe they will teach you the meaning of whore.

malik: and one more thing. take echosqueeeeeeeek along with you when you go to join the uzbek snakes recently captured by our soldiers in Wana. Echosqueeeek poses as some kind of a Great Muslim Hero while hiding out in the US - maybe he ought to put his money where his mouth is as well.

As for arjun: I am glad you join him in declaring musharaff a whore. You see, the moment you leave the US, arjun will wet his pants with delight - since that is exactly what he has been doing every time he has come across a news item of ``pakis`` being deported. So, please advise arjun that you are no longer a paki but some kind of an honorary uzbek, so he doesnt wet his pants anymore (his landlord has already started wondering about the smell that comes from his apartment since he hasnt had time to clean all those pants he has wet).

Moving the deck chairs,

It is comical to see the pakistanis talking about the type of govt in pakistan as though it makes any difference. Zia took the country on an islamic path, all of the subsequent govts including a democratic ones with a female as PM have remained with the same policy including the honour killing legalisation. The jihadic trend of pakistan was reinforced by the bhuttos.
For pakistan no govt will make any difference, it is evolving per the darwenian selection imposed on the people at the time of partition, the firm belief in TNT. Mushy is the perfect example, born in delhi, moved to pakistan and has been the architect of the first formal joint operation with the jihadis, the kargill invasion.
Pakistan has created its own version of islam, the jihadic version, propelled from the madrassas to the world far and wide. There will be no economic progress for pakistan, there will be no investments when the ghovt is essebtially jihadic.

Poverty has increased 20 percent in the last decade and the fools of pakistan talk of pak economic progress. Only improving statistics is the number of beggers in pak streets, a reflection of the same begging to the US by mushy. a nation of beggers, jihadic republic of beggers, and the type of govt pakistan has or will have is irrelevenat. It is a darwenian evolution.

Passing by a college



I pass by Urdu College on University Road daily, and I thought as a Pakistani it is my duty to fellow citizens to tell them of what the very idea of education has been reduced to:

Often, students belonging to a political party play ``Islamic`` songs by copying popular film tunes. Then another party with an ethnic background blares music and speeches to disseminate their ``ideology`` to students and passersby.

One day, I saw a majlis being broadcast on loudspeakers. This was obviously in response to what the other group was doing by way of publicizing its ``Islamic ideology.``

///////////

Here we have pakistanis talking about the type of govt, while the tahmeds asserts that there are only a few madrassas imparting hatred, for YLH it is the poverty that is making the pakistanis jihadis, here is a gem, it is the universities that is creating the jihadis.

Hatred has permeated every aspecy of pak society. There was a lengthy post by romair about the career options for pak youth, kashmir jihad, sectarian killers, and the taliban and the international jihad covering chechniya and the philippines. It is time that the pakistanis accept the permeation of TNT germinated hatred in the ir society and start attacking the symbols of it, on which ever walls they can find.

Omair: I think macro economic indicators do not make a nation stronger in the long term. Institutional stability does though, what is the significant difference between India or Italy (with all it`s corruption scandals and different prime ministers)and Pakistan. Both go through repeated bouts of leadership changes and India is as mired in corruption and caste, religious and ethnic politics as Pakistan (probably more in India`s case) the difefrence is institutions ahve some credibility, there is a accepted system of succession. It is not about holding power at all costs, and they have a bureaucracy which ensures an elections credibility is accepted. You have none of those factors in Pakistan and this over dependence on personality cults leads us back to the Ayub Khan government.

P.s: You seem disillusioned with the PTI nowadays, I hope you stick it out, Pakistani politics has it`s ups and downs and you never know somtimes people who were thought never to have a chance, end up either as the Prime Minister or leading the largest party in Parliament.

Romair at # 15:

``To take any kind of stance against the USA, Pakistan has to first straighten out its economy. Beggars cannot be chosers. Once the economy is sorted out, all other issues will sort themselves out. Including politics and elections. ``

Bull`s eye.

Pakistanis and Indians living their lives in luxury in America and Europe should not be giving us lessons in true democracy (read bringing corrupt leaders back) and not imposing wars on our own citizens (read sheltering foreign terrorists). We have the right to live a good life too.

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Whether General Whore`s democracy is real or sham is a secondary question and quite frankly a waste of time and misdirected debate. The primary and the most urgent question is this: how long will it take our brave soldiers to capture this whore and bring him to justice for using gunship helicopters and heavy artillary against the citizenary of Pakistan at the behest of a foreign power.

God willing, I will live to see the day when this whore will be sentenced to death by firing from gunship helicopter. An example will be made out of him so that no future dictator of ours will ever dream of unleasing our armed forces on our own citizens.