- Pakistan’s distinguished leaders
Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself – Leo Tolstoy
This irony of life has caused many men and women of exceptional intellect and competence topple like pins. We can commence the case study from Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (ZAB) – an outstanding individual educated at Berkley and Oxford, a skillful orator and a crowd puller. His colourful career in politics was full of remarkable achievements but his end was too soon and too tragic.
Uprisings against the decade old rule of ailing President General Ayub Khan was the opportune moment for ZAB to part ways and establish his mass based Pakistan People’s party in 1967. He attracted intellectuals, youth and ordinary people from all walks of life aspiring for a transition from dictatorship to democracy. His socialist ideology created an awareness of fundamental rights at the lowest level with his slogan of roti kapra aur makaan that gave birth to Jiyalas – a force to be reckoned with and totally loyal till this day to the Bhutto name.
The PPP emerged as the strongest political party in West Pakistan in the 1970 general elections. Awami League scored a decisive victory in East Pakistan and an overall majority in the National Assembly but was denied the opportunity to form a government at the center. Some believe that ZAB’s undue haste to become the prime minister supported by the fickle minded and fumbling army chief, contributed to the breakaway of East Pakistan. Indian forces entered East Pakistan in aid of Mukti Bahini and around 70,000 Pakistani were captured as prisoners of war.
The army installed ZAB as civilian Chief Martial Law administrator. He replaced General Mohamed Yahya Khan as the president of Pakistan and later became prime minister. He brought home the prisoners of war, held the historic Islamic summit attended by all Muslim heads of state and laid the foundation of our nuclear program. His most significant achievement is the passing of a new constitution in 1973 that has remained intact ever since.
MNS remained faithful to the army till his mentor General Ziaul Haq’s untimely demise. Subsequently, he had a change of heart and developed an obsession to make the fiercely independent, disciplined and institutionalised army subservient to civilian rule
He pursued an independent foreign policy and introduced his socialist policies, aimed at reducing the power of big business by nationalising industry, banks, insurance, shipping and education. These policies may have been well intentioned and ideological but proved disastrous for the economy.
He used Islamic socialism and democracy (neither of which were his strong points) as vehicles to rise to power. He could not change his feudal mindset that warranted obedience or his arrogant sense of superiority. He embarked on suppressing the opposition and to exercise absolute control over the army and the establishment. He failed to fully comprehend the direction in which the wind was blowing. The army stepped in and put ZAB in prison. His refusal to change, led him to his tragic execution in 1976.
ZAB’s daughter Benazir inherited many of her father’s qualities and his party. She studied at Harvard and Oxford and was groomed by her father in politics. She learnt the hard way through years of hardships and confinements and witnessed the rise and fall of her father. She was a natural leader, immensely popular among the masses and won the respect and admiration of world leaders at the international level.
The army decided to return the country to democracy and hold general elections subsequent to the sudden death of President General Mohamed Zia ul Haq in a plane crash in 1988. Benazir Bhutto (fondly known as BB) became the first female prime minister of Pakistan from 1988 to 1990 and again from 1993 to 1996. Both times she was dismissed prematurely by civilian Presidents under the infamous article 58(2)b that now stands revoked. She changed the party image from socialist to liberal but could not gather the support of conservatives, religious scholars or the establishment. Her two stints became marred with controversies of corruption and poor administration.
She went into voluntary exile in 1997 and lived in Dubai and London from where she firmly controlled the party and attended personally to all party matters that became her life mission. It appears she also was haunted by a belief in her destiny to rule. Meanwhile, al Qaeda and its offshoot TTP had taken roots in Pakistan after the US invasion of Afghanistan and were using the lethal weapon of children blowing their suicide jackets murdering innocent bystanders and even school children. It also posed a grave danger to BB.
An American brokered deal with President General Pervez Musharaf in 2007 granted her amnesty and cleared her way to return but was advised to wait till after the general elections. BB defied the advice and returned to Karachi in October 2007 where she survived an ambush by suicide bombers on her mammoth rally that killed 136 people. Even this scale of violence did not change her fatalistic determination to continue appearing in public meetings without any comprehensive state security. She paid for her defiance by losing her life to an assassin in Rawalpindi on 27 December 2007.
Mian Mohamed Nawaz Sharif (MNS) is a home grown individual, who climbed the ladder from bottom to top by mere perseverance and playing politics. His initiation in politics as a minister in the Punjab cabinet in 1981 was allegedly through the courtesy of the military governor. He was later elected twice as chief minister of Punjab supported by the army and the business sector.
In 1990 he was elected as prime minister on the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) platform and dismissed by the President after three years. In 1997 he was re-elected as prime minister heading his own faction of the Pakistan Muslim League and authorised the nuclear tests in Chagai in 1998. His second stint was also prematurely terminated when he dismissed the army chief in absentia and the army retaliated by staging a coup.
His entire family was exiled to Saudi Arabia for ten years under an agreement with the army chief. His third comeback as Prime Minister commenced in 2013 that remained turbulent and eventually ended in his disqualification and life imprisonment by the courts in the Panama off-shore accounts case.
MNS remained faithful to the army till his mentor General Ziaul Haq’s untimely demise. Subsequently, he had a change of heart and developed an obsession to make the fiercely independent, disciplined and institutionalised army subservient to civilian rule. Despite distinct indicators and repeated debacles, he continued to underestimate the power of the institutions and change accordingly. The Pakistani institutions collectively had the last laugh that sealed his political career.
We now have a new Oxford educated ex cricketer prime minister. He has the unenviable challenge to prove that he will bring change and will break the record that no civilian prime minister in our country has been able to complete his full term. We wish him luck.
