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TUQ’s agenda to oust corrupt politicians relies on the strength of his oratory alone. Yet he achieved in gaining only reluctant support from Imran, who would also love to get to the helm without such a tedious and painful exercise as the elections, which in no way can be held completely fairly in the Islamic Republic, even if saints watched over them. However, had TUQ been successful in achieving his goal, it would have made him the saviour of this country. A status Imran longs to covet for himself.
The electoral candidates detested him since the media, for reasons unbeknownst to the rest of us, saturated the air with the possibility of a sans-election revolution.
And this leaves us to speculate upon the intentions of the military. The coverage of the media was unprecedented. I don’t remember any event or catastrophe that ever compelled the media to sacrifice their relentless streams of commercials and regular news bulletins. God knows best but it gave the impression that TUQ had bought the airtime of the channels, so that nothing mattered more than him and his deluxe container. He allegedly has a lot of international financiers but this sort of money is usually invested after analysing market trends or after having certain guarantees by authentic guarantors. Also the outburst of the notorious anchors, when the movement was dying, made it a rather dubious debacle. Nothing can be said with authority except that the show flopped miserably, both for the people at large, as well as, the benefactors and backers of this horse, if there were any.
Mushi’s arrival, on the contrary is trivial but its after effects may not be so. The only person who wants him back is probably Ahmed Raza Kasuri but even that is not certain. What needs to be done is to send someone like Pasha, again, to instil some common sense in him, that is if Mushi is deluded enough to believe that his participation would be the best thing to happen to this country since its inception. If he is plain homesick or needs to restore his image as a daredevil, who went into enemy territory on the eve of Kargil, a brief visit should be allowed to him (not as short as those that were afforded to the Sharif brothers). He can rest comfortably in his Chak Shehzad palatial house, dream about what could have been and fly back to where he belongs to while away his time in music and dance parties. His stay here would only add to the unrest of the election process and the teething stage of the new government that succeeds them. All the parties except Q League and MQM have in the past, promised to take grave action against him on his arrival. None can afford a conflict at this time of the year related to an erstwhile COAS.
The judiciary hasn’t shown any enthusiasm whatsoever towards his return. In fact, if he arrives, he could get charged with article 6 for clamping a second Martial Law, giving away air bases to US military, much the same as Haqqani was for writing a letter. But, unlike Haqqani, the judiciary hasn’t made public their intention to bring back Musharraf by force yet. (After all, their judgement against Aslam Beg had the air taken out of their power balloon in no time).
As if what he did to the military’s image while in charge wasn’t enough, he is coming back on the assertion that the military won't let him fall prey to the vindictive political parties and the resentful judiciary by taking all the cases against him to military courts. In case of not doing so, he can conveniently lay the blame on the then DG ISI, the corps commanders and the ruling party whom he confided in while taking major decisions like the Bugti assassination, Laal Masjid and the imposing of the state of emergency.
The media can never take a line against the military’s agenda, but they still remember Musharraf personally as someone who put to hold the transmission of a number of channels for an indefinite period of time. Also, religious fundamentalists are not fond of him either and have previously attempted to assassinate him.
He has allegedly been in contact with the Saudi King, and also while Nawaz Sharif was there last month. There were talks about his return in those parleys but it is a fact that the Saudis, like most of us, sense that he is an exhausted resource and only want to spare him any unpleasant treatment for his past services to them and the US. .
Benazir’s return didn’t go well and, in fact gave us an apology for a government. The unfortunate scenario of Musharraf meeting with a similar fate would not augur well for the country. At least not for its reputation, which is already much tarnished besides causing anger in some military quarters. It is in his best interest, and ours, for him to stay where he is.
The views expressed by this blogger and in the following reader comments do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.
