Musharraf: Poster Boy for Democracy?

And Bush Probably Thinks Pol Pot was an Agrarian Reformer!

I know I shouldn’t be surprised at President Bush’s casual disregard for inconvenient facts. Yet Bush’s undeserved praise for President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan floored me!

Ignoring the fact that Musharraf seized power from an elected government in a 1999 coup, as well as the fact that Musharraf has presided over one of Asia’s less laudatory human rights records, President Bush somehow found reason to praise Musharraf’s reputed “vision for a democratic Pakistan” and “free and open elections” in the days prior to arriving in Pakistan. The awkward love-fest continued during Bush’s day-long visit of March 4, with Bush once again praising Musharraf for his long-term commitment to democracy. Said Bush: “In the long run, he [Musharraf] understands that extremists can be defeated by freedom and democracy and prosperity and better education” (quoted in the Washington Post 3/5/06). It must be an awfully long run judging from the state of human rights in Pakistan today.

Musharraf seems a strange choice to become Bush’s latest poster boy for freedom and democracy. As noted above, he became President six years ago after having seized power from an elected government in a bloodless coup. Musharraf has since refused to hold national elections, and even forced a bill through parliament granting him the special privilege of remaining army chief while also serving as President. The local elections Musharraf did allow in the summer of 2005 were of questionable validity, marked as they were by “brazen intimidation, coercion, and pre-poll rigging.” During the campaign, continues Human Rights Watch, “many opposition candidates faced violence and intimidation at the hands of the police and civil administration” (“Overview of Human Rights Issues in Pakistan,” Human Rights Watch, 2006).

Intimidation and coercion were much in evidence on the day of Bush’s visit, as well. Pakistani police preemptively arrested a number of opposition politicians. Police also broke up at least one peaceful demonstration in the city of Rawalpindi, some 10 miles from the capital, beating and arresting some twenty political activists. Complained former cricket star turned opposition leader Imran Khan: “To call this democracy is a joke.” (Washington Post, 3/5/06).

The joke is most certainly lost on Pakistani women, who today continue to suffer systemic discrimination and grave human rights abuses. According to Human Rights Watch, citing figures from Pakistan’s own Interior Ministry, there have been over 4100 so-called “honor killings” since 2001. Despite international pressure on this issue, the Pakistani government has done little to curtail this practice and, in fact, still allows for the murderers to escape justice altogether through a monetary payment to the deceased’s next of kin. Musharraf himself is hardly enlightened on the issue of women’s rights. In response to two recent and high profile rape cases, Musharraf dismissively commented that rape in Pakistan was becoming a “money-making concern” and an easy way to obtain a foreign visa. Musharraf has not since apologized for his insensitive remarks.

Human Rights Watch also notes that sectarian violence is growing in Pakistan, while religious freedom is decreasing. Opposition politicians regularly face arbitrary arrest and detention. In one recent case a twenty-three year prison sentence was handed down for the “crime” of reading a letter critical of President Musharraf to journalists! An April 2005 crack-down on the opposition Pakistani People’s Party (PPP) sent thousands of PPP supporters (and several members of Parliament) to jail. Pakistan’s jail system is known for its secrecy and its use of torture, a convenient thing for the Bush administration when it seeks to “disappear” tight-lipped or troublesome detainees of its own.

What, then, does Bush see in an authoritarian leader like President Musharraf? Obviously, Bush sees a fellow warrior in the fight against terrorism (with the added bonus being that, unlike Bush, Musharraf actually has genuine military experience). For that reason, the Bush Administration refuses to do anything more than pay lip service to democratization and human rights in Musharraf’s Pakistan. As Human Rights Watch put it so succinctly in a press release on Bush’s visit: “What Bush and Musharraf have in common is a shared commitment to the priority, above all else, of the ‘war on terror’,” not democracy (“Pakistan: U.S. Human Rights Record,” Human Rights Watch, 3/2/06).

The one thing that the American people and the Pakistani people do both share in common, unfortunately, is the current demand that we sacrifice our liberties in the name of fighting terrorism.

Peace!
Historian