ELECTION 99
US EDITION
COLUMNISTS
DIARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ELECTIONS
ARCHIVES

Search Rediff

Musharraf rejects time-frame for restoration of democracy

Pakistan's chief executive General Pervez Musharraf has ruled out a return to democracy in Pakistan till all the objectives spelled out by him after the military coup are achieved. ''I cannot set a time-frame for return to democracy,'' he told BBC TV in an interview.

General Musharraf said he was working to put in place ''real democracy'' in the country and that Pakistan would never go back to the ''embarrassment'' that passed for democracy before the army took over on October 12. He said politics in Pakistan had become hostage to feudal landlords who failed to keep track of the aspirations of the people once they were elected.

He, however, did not say if he planned to carry out land reforms -- a highly contentious issue in the country. ''Politics in Pakistan is a game of the elite ruling class,'' he claimed. General Musharraf described illiteracy and poverty as the two most important reasons for the failure of democracy. Poverty meant the rich could purchase votes which prevented democracy from gaining roots in Pakistan, which has spent half of its 50-year existence under military rule.

The masses, the general said, could never emerge from the vicious circle of persecution and atrocities unleashed by the previous governments. The only option available to the government to emerge from the current mess is to move ahead on the path of development.

Meanwhile, the Mahaz-i-Tahafiz-i-Pakistan, or the organisation for the protection of Pakistan, has questioned the military government's intentions in not covering the tenure of President Zia-ul-Haq under the newly-promulgated accountability ordinance which provides for a jail term extending up to 14 years and bars the convicts from public office for 21 years.

Mahaz's president Mukhtar Rana, in a statement, said the new regime should not spare the corrupt of the late general's period if its drive against corruption is to bear fruit. The Pakistani people would not be fooled by the selective drive against the corrupt of the Nawaz Sharief and Benazir Bhutto regimes. According to The Wall Street Journal, Ejaz-ul-Haq, Gen Zia's son, has amassed more than one million dollars and has siphoned it abroad, he said.

UNI

Tell us what you think of this report