Pervez Musharraf’s supporters have moved on
General Pervez Musharraf's return to Pakistan after four years in self-imposed exile, may have led to a media frenzy, but the fact is that it is essentially a non-event as of now. The former Pakistani Army chief, who wrested power in a military coup in 1999 and ruled for almost a decade till he was forced to step down in 2008, hopes to recapture power in the upcoming general election that has been scheduled for May 11. In other words, Gen Musharraf has less than two months to build an electoral campaign from scratch. This will be near-impossible, primarily because the former President simply does not have the kind of broadbased, nationwide popular support he needs to shake up the establishment. Whatever political points that he may have scored with the people during his presidency have clearly worn off in these past years. Besides, Gen Musharraf was never really a grassroots leader to begin with, unlike, say, Benazir Bhutto. One only has to compare the estimated 1,000 to 2,000 supporters who turned up at Karachi airport on Sunday to receive Gen Musharraf to the tens of thousands who welcomed Bhutto at that same airport in 2007 when she returned from her nine-year long exile. Moreover, in the four years that the former President and Army chief has been shuttling between london and Dubai, he has been relegated to the political fringe in both the Pakistani power centres of Islamabad and Rawalpindi, and most of his supporters, in his absence, have switched sides.
But Gen Musharraf seems to believe that, given the high levels of popular political disenchantment that prevails in Pakistan, he actually has a chance of returning at the helm. Towards that extent, he has already begun portraying himself as the saviour who will rescue Pakistan from its present state of chaos and misrule. While addressing his supporters at the airport, Gen Musharraf said: “I have come back for you. I want you to get back the Pakistan that I had left when we used to feel proud in ourselves”. The former President's strategy of leveraging in his favour the anti-incumbency sentiment may be a good idea in theory, but the people may not buy into. Given that it is the first time that a democratically elected, civilian Government has completed its full five-year term, it is highly unlikely that the people of Pakistan will vote back to power a military man. Second, accusations of engineering Benazir Bhutto's assassination continue to dog Gen Musharraf. He will be hard put to convince the voters of his innocence. Still, by returning to Pakistan in the face of death threats from the Taliban and pending arrest warrants against him, the forever ambitious General is not in a mood to hang his boots. He is certainly aiming more at the long-term prospect than at an immediate electoral dividend. He may not return to power just yet — and never, if his rivals had their way. But he is going to keep trying and needling the next democratic regime.