The President declares a state of emergency, but his army is no longer so popular and the U.S. may withdraw military aidPakistan's political crisis has reached its predictable zenith, with President Pervez Musharraf declaring a state of emergency on Nov. 3. Opposition party workers, civil society leaders, human-rights activists, lawyers, members of the judiciary, even former intelligence chief Gul Hamid, an extremist sympathizer—but no members of the armed forces—have been arrested without charge and jailed. "Inaction at this moment is suicide for Pakistan," said Musharraf in a nationally televised statement. "And I cannot allow this country to commit suicide."
Suicide or murder, this move has taken Pakistan back to where it began—as a poor, developing nation with great promise that had been ruined by 60 years of bad administration and an opportunistic and dominating military which effectively seals off any democratic impulses. "We are in 2008, but Pakistan is back to 1958," Nasir, a reader of the popular Pakistani Web site pkpolitics.com, posted sorrowfully on its site on Nov. 4. The country has been led by military rule or martial law for more years than it has by democratic election, and, judging by the army's support for Musharraf's recent unpopular move, the generals are in no hurry to return to the barracks.
That Musharraf has overplayed his hand is obvious. Blaming his own nine-year rule for increased terrorist activity and a newly emboldened judiciary, as an excuse to prevent a democratic election, is audacious—and could prove foolhardy.
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