Musharraf better than democrats

ISLAMABAD: This is with reference to Ammar Rashid’s article of June 22 titled ‘Dictatorships are bad – always’. The fact of the matter is that Pervez Musharraf was more of a democrat than Nawaz Sharif, Asif Ali Zardari, Imran Khan and Benazir Bhutto put together. And I say that because one only has to look at the ‘democratic’ nature of the parties that these people lead — the PML-N and the PPP being good examples.

Compare this to the army where the emphasis is on decision-making, and teaching officers strategy, and with minimum resources.  Agreed, not all dictators were good, but one only has to look at the great men of history. Most if not all were strong-willed and not afraid to take calculated decisions. Consider Franklin D Roosevelt, Churchill and Charles De Gaulle and look at what they achieved because of their strong-willed characters.

Democracy does not work in countries where systems are weak. It can only work in a country with strong system such as the US, UK, Canada or Malaysia. And systems can only be developed when there is economic stability – something that was to be found in Pakistan under Musharraf’s rule.

As for General Zia, yes he was a bad dictator but where was the media when he was in power? Large sections of it were supporting him. And it was Musharraf who gave them freedom, and they used and abused that freedom to spit venom against him. In the process, they ended up giving the impression to the rest of the world that the people of Pakistan are pro-Taliban.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 23^rd, 2010.