The military loses and regains clout

Within hours of his arrival, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto took over as chief marshal law administrator and president.

(This is the sixth in a series of eight articles on the role of the military from 1971-2007)

Within hours of his arrival in Pakistan Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who had won the largest number of seats in the 1970 elections took over as chief marshal law administrator and president on December 20, 1971.

Unfortunately, Bhutto declined to change the structure of governance of the country which gave political, social and physical power to the Combine (civil and military services). On July 5, 1977 General Ziaul Haq deposed Bhutto and executed him on April 4, 1979. Zia unleashed a reign of terror by hanging people in public and inflicting scores of thousands of lashes on the backs of political activists. He also brutally suppressed the uprising by the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy in Sindh in 1984. This reign of terror cost the Combine hugely in prestige and clout.

Unidentified enemies killed Ziaul Haq in an air crash on August 18, 1988. The Vice-Chief of Army Staff General Mirza Aslam Beg succeeded Ziaul Haq and ordered general elections. Benazir Bhutto’s Peoples Party emerged as the largest single party in the elections. The general approved the swearing in of Benazir as prime minister on three conditions: first, the military will remain independent with regard to its own affairs; second, the prime minister shall have no jurisdiction over the nuclear programme; third, the veteran civil service executive Ghulam Ishaq Khan, former finance minister and senate chairman would be the president, Yaqub Khan, a retired general, will continue as foreign minister and VA Jaffery, a senior civil servant will be the administrative head of the finance ministry.

The Combine deposed Benazir in 1991 through political manipulation, rigged elections and brought in Mian Nawaz Sharif, as prime minister. However Nawaz Sharif could not perform and he too was shown the gate in 1993. Faced by limited choice, the Combine once again called Benazir to serve as prime minister. Once again, her performance was below the mark set by the Combine, who removed her in 1996 and ordered fresh elections, the fourth in a period of eight years. Apparently, not-so-clever management of the election exercise by the Combine awarded Nawaz Sharif a large majority in the National Assembly.

Erroneously, Nawaz Sharif assessed that a large majority in the parliament amounted to his becoming a sovereign. His head turned. Recklessly, he rushed constitutional amendments to bump up his authority. He showed his contempt for the judiciary by sending his strongmen to raid the Supreme Court. Nawaz also forced the head of the Combine, Army Chief General Jahangir Karamat, to resign.

In the eyes of the Combine, Nawaz Sharif had become too big for his boots. He was dismissed, arrested and later exiled as he attempted to dismiss another head of the Combine, General Pervez Musharraf. With this, the Combine exhausted its options, for the time being, to use politicos as prime minister. On October 12, 1999 General Pervez Musharraf assumed the title of Chief Executive Officer to preside over the government.

By 2007, the chief patron of Pakistan, the US, assessed that the Combine under Musharraf had become weak and required a political shot in its arm. A deal was arranged between Musharraf and Benazir. The latter agreed to come to the help of the Combine on the condition that all criminal and civil cases against her, her husband Asif Ali Zardari and other accomplices, pending in the courts of law, would stand withdrawn and all convictions pardoned. The deal was signed, sealed and delivered through the promulgation of the National Reconciliation Ordinance of 2007. However, the accord soured before it could be put into operation.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 27^th, 2010.