If you win the election is rigged. If you lose it is a free expression of the people’s will. If we win it is despite some partial rigging. If we lose we will take to the streets. That, in sum, was the position of the Pakistan Opposition before the polls, covering every possible angle, and empowering the Opposition to react as it wishes whatever the outcome. As a foretaste of post-Musharraf “democracy” it could hardly be bettered. Especially so when both the PPP and the PML (N) have off-and-on before the polls, indicated their willingness to work with the President.

Benazir herself carefully avoided criticising Musharraf and Zardari spoke of a power-sharing deal with the general after his wife’s assassination. So now we are back to the not unfamiliar period of “deals” and power brokering, an environment in which the politicians flourish. In which also - and this point surely is currently at the heart of the matter - the general remains a factor to be reckoned with.

Zardari and Sharif have said and done enough to define themselves as power grabbers, and their glib references to “democracy” compare unfavourably with the general’s bold and patently sincere declarations on this subject.

“We will build democracy in our own way” he has said, while denouncing the West’s “unrealistic obsession with its own form of democracy”.

Political adventurism

A Zardari-Sharif partnership represents political adventurism with a large element of mutual distrust built into it, a coalition that is bound to be shortlived. That Musharraf foresaw this is surely obvious. As also that rigging would not yield any dividends, short or long term.

In fact de-rigging or what one report describes as “intelligent rigging” was the answer to his immediate problems. This involved throwing the burden of responsibility on the socalled mainline parties while retaining his position as President.

All of which led him to the conclusion that anything short of an electoral “victory” for the Opposition would plunge Pakistan into a turmoil that could lead to its disintegration. Ironically then the PML(Q)’s defeat is precisely what, given his long term vision, he wanted to bring about. Three factors emboldened him to do so. Despite show-window politically correct criticism from the Americans, their support is assured. Despite Kayani’s depoliticisation of the Army which has the general’s silent approval the army chief’s cooperation is also assured. And finally, despite Musharraf’s seeming political emasculation he, as President, retains the power to dismiss “an elected prime minister.

The General in his labyrinth

No national leader anywhere has been afflicted as Musharraf has been by so many pressures from so many quarters domestic and international, besides having to keep a variety of insurgencies at bay. Yet he has been able to make his way through this jungle of problems without any serious loss of his or Pakistan’s interests. He has emerged as an astute, tough, earthy yet visionary leader that has managed, despite many crisis, to held his country together. The contrast with the PPP leadership and Sharif, supposedly epitomising “democracy”, is so stark as to be beyond words.

Zardari’s volubility has already led him to declare that he would “change the system” and “redefine the war on terror”. What this means is anyone’s guess. It isn’t the Americans alone who will feel that the tragic “swamp” that replaced Benazir by her husband is a heavy, though temporary, price to pay for a hopeful reinforcement of Musharraf’s position.

Three footnotes to the above are as follows. New Delhi’s National Security Adviser has expressed “grudging respect” for the way the Pakistani leader “managed to overcome his struggles”. For India does the general, and not anyone else, represent the stability it desperately needs in a neighbour? The answer is obvious.

As for Pakistan’s judiciary, in the last five decades or so those in power have interfered with and bullied them, with Sharif even ordering a raid on the Supreme Court. Then there is the charge that Musharraf is a despot.

Could all that has happened in recent weeks have happened if he had been a real dictator? Finally, some time before the election two American surveys reported that “Bhutto’s party and the PML(N) would win, with PML (Q) trailing in third place, and that this would be conclusive evidence of a fair election. Did the general in civilian clothes arrange a defeat that promises to be a victory in disguise?

Here is a miscellany of off-the cuff thoughts. Doesn’t Spielberg realise that a high prportion of the members of the world community have political differences with China? Is it reasonable to demand satisfaction on these matters as the price for cooperation in the Olympics.

American and Western doubts about Pakistan’s ability to protect its nuclear assets is due to a deeply inbuilt western conviction that non-western people are inefficient, irresponsible, undependable and so on. Old, old prejudices still at work.

BJP’s ridiculous call

The Hyde Act is not binding on India. It is binding on the Bush administration and all depends on whether Bush can bypass it. So BJP’s call for the PM’s apology is ridiculous. It should learn to read the text. Equally ridiculous is all the fuss about Sonia’s Belgian honour. The EC has been agonising over a triviality. As for the national flag and the respect it rightly demanded what it symbolised is more important than the symbol.