Two amazing, back to back, pieces of news in two days about the same person: General Musharraf. Both from America. One, a survey conducted in Pakistan in September by the research wing of the US Republican Party says
Musharraf is ahead of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif in popularity among Pakistanis.
No wonder the Republican Party was routed in recent American elections. Its research wing must have been doing surveys of American voters and finding the Republican candidates more popular than the Democratic candidates.
The second news piece contradicts what the first one claims. The American magazine 'National Journal' in its current issue quotes some observers that Musharraf is at his weakest he has ever been and the "only friend in the world" Musharraf has is US President George W. Bush.
Even More interesting piece of news is hidden in the first one. The survey found out that 70 per cent of the Pakistanis said their personal economic conditions remained unchanged or worsened over the past four years; and they want both exiled former prime ministers to be allowed to return home to contest the next general election. Majority of the respondents also said that Pakistan was heading in the ‘wrong direction’.
I don't know which one of the two statements Musharraf is going to believe. I hope he believes the first one and in his excitement sheds off his uniform and runs in some kind of election, such as a Nazim of some Union Council.
According to the survey, the PML-Q is at the top in Punjab, followed by Nawaz Sharif’s PML-N. I hope ruling League also believes in the first statement as it always follows "his master's voice". I see good signs. On Saturday, Punjab's Law Minister Basharat Raja applauded the survey's findings.
Is Musharraf more popular for taking Pakistan in the wrong direction, not improving or making worse the lot of an overwhelming majority of Pakistanis?
The Journal says that Musharraf's core constituency is the military, and there are indications that he has started to lose that as well. "There's a lot of anxiety about Musharraf's reckless behavior", one of experts says.
There is a little bad news for Musharraf too. Analysts have advised that Washington should abandon the tendency to support the military "strongmen" and instead have more faith in civilian leadership. They have also asserted that even if Musharraf were to leave the scene, "Pakistan is not likely to descend into anarchy nor will its nuclear weapons fall into terrorist hands, or its government come under the control of mullahs and militants". South Asia expert Marvin Weinbaum who says that if Musharraf is "taken out tomorrow, there would be strong continuity" because the vice chief of the army would step up.
Pakistan's ambassador to the US Mahmud Ali Durrani is quoted acknowledging that the military is growing weary of ruling the country. Freedberg writes: "Sooner, not later, he will lose his footing".
According to Alexis Debat, a former French counter-terrorism office, who quotes Stephen Cohen of Brookings Institute that "there’s a lot of anxiety about Musharraf’s reckless behavior".
