The General's Scepter

Yesterday was Wednesday and it was the day when the Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf decided to retire from the army to lead the country as a civilian leader.

Now I am a fully fledged Pakistani lad, I’m not mixed with anything else. My ancestry comes from the north near Islamabad. Ethnicity wise I’m known as what they call a Pathan. It’s a warrior race. My forefather himself, who was from Kabul, was a general in the Genghis Khan Armies that ravaged the whole of Asia. I like my culture and the richness of my heritage. It invigorates me to know my family tree.

However frankly speaking in my opinion the Pakistani society aint that fly after all. There is a wide rich poor divide and many people think in different perspectives. The poor are only interested in becoming rich and the only possible way other than working hard is through graft and corruption. Plus they have a much polarised point of view for religion it being Islam. They just take it too seriously.

On the other hand the rich are just arrogant and hypocritical. They love to show off their wealth and say how into religion they are but they just use religious gatherings as an excuse to gossip. The rich syndrome pakis exist in the four corners of the world.

There is no such thing as a middle class Pakistani with perfect thought flow who is basically a nice guy. Actually there are a few. Its kinda silly for me to generalise and stereotype.

Oh well haiz.... getting back to General Musharraf or should I say Mr Musharraf, he is to be sworn in as a civilian leader today to lead the country into the parliamentary elections that will be held on the 9th of January next year. Ironic how Singapore’s terminal 3 will be opening for passenger transport at full operation on that very day.

I’m sure everyone has been reading the news about Musharraf plunging the country into a state of emergency and dissolving the constitution and jailing opposition leaders who have been deemed as being rude if I may towards the administration and yada yada yada.

What do I think of this? Frankly speaking Musharraf has probably been the best leader in Pakistan history ranking with the likes of Zia Ul Haq and Abbas Khan. Mind you the other 2 were also military generals. In the other corner we see people like Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif both of whom are former PMs. Here’s the thing that kicks oh so well. Both were charged for corruption and graft against the state. Miss Bhutto even did it twice and that too as PM on both occasions.

Yes it does look like Musharraf is doing something undemocratic in nature but c’mon he’s a general for crying out loud. He lived his whole adult life serving the Pakistani army. The army as an institution itself is undemocratic in nature. Pakistan is a tough country to govern in case you have not noticed. Honestly speaking at this point in time I really dunno what to think about the situation in Pakistan. Give it democracy and it becomes a wise crack suicidal and extremist state that will probably be corrupt. Let it be in a semi dictatorship and it might just get more difficult to rule country as whole.

Paki ( expect more analysis on this subject later on)