Adil Najam
In a nationally televised speech, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, President of Pakistan, has just announced his resignation, pre-empting a move to impeach him by the parliament.
This post has been updated to add news photos from this momentous day in Pakistan’s political history. The pictures speak eloquently of the moods and thoughts of the day. (Scroll down to see the video of Gen. Musharraf’s resignation speech).
Participate in a poll on what might be Pakistan’s future post-Musharraf, here. Watch the video of the speech below.
Here is a Pervez Musharraf time-line, published in The News:
August 1943: Born in Delhi, India
1964: Joins Pakistani army.
1998: Becomes army chief of staff.
October 1999: Seizes power in a bloodless military coup, overthrowing the prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. In response, the Commonwealth suspends Pakistan’s membership.
June 20 2001: Makes himself president, replacing Rafiq Tarar, while remaining head of the army. Tarar is forced out of office when the parliament that elected him is dissolved.
July 2001: Holds first meeting with the Indian prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, at Agra in India. No progress is made because of differences over the disputed territory of Kashmir.
September 2001: George Bush courts Musharraf, asking him to join him in his “war on terror” and help defeat the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan. The US president promises Pakistan $1bn in aid.
April 2002: Wins a referendum giving him another five years in office. Observers criticise the referendum as blighted by irregularities.
May 2002: Pakistan test fires three medium-range surface-to-surface missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Musharraf insists his country would not be the one to initiate war.
August 2002: Consolidates his power still further, giving himself the right to dismiss an elected parliament.
October 2002: Pakistan’s first general election since Musharraf seized power in 1999 results in a hung parliament.
November 2002: Mir Zafarullah Jamali becomes the first civilian prime minister since 1999. He is a member of a Musharraf-supporting party.
November 2003: Pakistan’s National Assembly meets for the first time since 1999.
December 2003: Musharraf promises to step down as head of the army by January 2005.
May 2004: Pakistan is readmitted to the Commonwealth.
December 2004: Musharraf announces he will stay on as head of the army.
August 2005: Pakistan tests its first nuclear-capable cruise missile.
March 2007: Musharraf suspends the chief justice, Iftakar Mohammed Chaudhry, triggering a wave of anger across the country and the first joint protests held by the parties of exiled former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif.
October 2007: Signs a corruption amnesty, opening the way for Bhutto’s return and a possible power-sharing agreement. Within hours of Bhutto’s arrival back in the country, bombers attack a Bhutto rally in Karachi, killing more than 100 people.
November 2007: Declares a state of emergency, rounding up opposition leaders at gunpoint. In the same month, Musharraf quits as head of the army, becoming a civilian president.
December 15 2007: Lifts state of emergency and announces plans to go ahead with parliamentary elections scheduled for January 8.
December 27 2007: Benazir Bhutto is assassinated at an election rally in Rawalpindi.
January 2008: Elections postponed until February 18.
February 2008: The two main opposition parties gain a clear majority in the elections.
August 2008: The two main parties strike a deal to impeach Musharraf if parliament backs the move.
August 18 2008: Musharraf announces his resignation
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The killing and suicide bombings you see today is Musharraf’s biggest legacy for Pakistan.
let us at least stand united against these murderers.
Why can’t people accept that there is good and bad in everyone. Musharraf made lots of mistakes but he also did some good things. Same for Zardari and Sharif. If we wait only for “perfect” people with no flaws then we will just fool ourselves and never achieve anything. Democracy needs people who can live with whoever the majority decides and then if they want to change that then they find and support someone else. That is what the process should be.
To the defenders of Lal Mosque; do you know what happened in 1979 when a person claimed to be Mahdi and occupied the Grand Mosque of Mecca with 100s of armed persons (including women and children), declared Jehad and asked the Muslims to accept him as Mahdi? A grand operation was conducted by the Saudi government with the help of the army sent by your Ameer-ul-Momineen (Zia-ul-Haq) and the French army and the Mosque was cleared with a lot of bloodshed!
Dear! This kind of militant activity cannot be tolerated even not by the Saudi government at the holiest place. Would you condemn a similar operation if that was a Mandir and the militants were Hindus? Can India tolerate that in Delhi? If some Chritian militants occupy a church in Washington DC and openly challenge the writ of the government what will happen??
i totally agree with shahid .. ppl delusiond to believ musharraf held on to power for his personal benefits will c the true picture really soon .. who-is-who will b out in the light in no time ..
musharraf resigned not bcoz he is cowrd but bcoz he knew current gov is just wasting time, delaying the day when they will hav to answer the public, by satisfying them with the impeachment proccess ..
but now as he has resigned, they are fretting over wat, how, when n y to do some thing about the judges !!! .. musharraf was the only hurdle according to zardari few days ago .. now wat ?? .. .
he is just buyin tym to loot!!!
when musharraf resigned zardari lost his fav punch bag, ready-made excuse to evry problem dat existed in pakistan ..
till the tym pakistani ppl wake up , he will b out of the country again !! …
ppl againt musharraf hav only 1 statement to giv “this is the victry of democracy !!!”
no 1 in the histry of pakistan held the question answer sessions like musharraf did !!! … no one!! infact he faced impeachment every day !!!
he was the most democratic leader !! ..
n now this new gov dzn giv a damn to wat v think … zardari simply gives the statement of his joice with a header “yeh 16 crore kee awaz hey ” ..
a prticular news channel ,blatantly against musharraf, is spreading the false picture of wat ppl of paksitan think .. according to a poll by a reputed news channel 72% ppl voted in favor of “musharraf shud not b impeached” ..
but discussion wnt open eyez .. tym will … as it has always been .. but this time plz b careful(take note if u hav amnesia,n u surely do) .. n learn a lesson,for a change !!!
One more thing.
Musharref power hungry, own ambitions, he did for himselves, Dictatior?
Am I missing something or what. Wasnt it Zardari who was called 10%, had swiss bank accounts and came back again to Pakistan just to take power. That b…tch only came to Pakistan to take over power!
Wasn’t it liar Nawaz Sharif have the same ambitions and only returned to Pakistan for power.
How can two parties who are up each others throats for as long as Pakistan existed can shake hands now. They only made peace for one reason just to kick Musharref out, and take power for themselves. So please dont use terms like democracy and all.
Plus I dont think Musharref held on to power for himself. Why does he need to hold on to power. Being a leader of a country like Pakistan is the most stressful job! And I dont see that he has made lots of money or lavish spendings for himself or his family. Are people blind or what?
Plus also I dont think Musharref held on to power for himself because there was not even a single able leader to hand over the power. “Aaa ja kay sirf do panidoo parties hain PPP ya phir Muslim League. And even if you give power to one of these parties ajj ja kay sirf do chooray leader hain ya zardari ya phir sharif.” If I was a president I would never ever give power to these people. Never!
Offff forget Musharref, Zardari, Nawaz…Who cares what we should be caring about is Pakistan and building or supporting the right people and encourage young people to come into politics.
I am not even pissed about PPP or ML-N it’s just as long as these people are in power the useless Fuedel system will never end and Pakistan will never improve! Never!
I dont understand the case when people are defending Lal Mosque and blaming it on government. I just read someone calling them innocent young students. Hello! Innocent if they are taking arms against you what innocent students. These students are not 10 or 9 they choose to take arm knowngly. Also can you tell me if a robber or a person who breaks a law or a rapist shouldnt he be punished either dont punish the law breakers then or dont blame the government.
Plus Lal Masjid situation, even you take american swat team or some best army or government there are bound to be some people killed. Plus as far as I remember these people inside were given a chance to surrender. And one of there leader tried to run wearing burka.
To be short dont say anything to government for this reason.
What Islam are they going to preach. One of sister here said a nice thing how can they preach islam when they themselves are sitting on an illeagal land. If they are so sincere with islam instead of buying weapons from the charity of people they could have rallied to buy the mosque for there school but they wasted money on bombs or whatever. Plus do you give zakah with haram money.
Please don’t support these people who dont know one bit about Islam or its proper teaching. A mullah doesn’t know Islam. And plus situation in Pakistan is not un-islamic. They should look at other countried. Actually we should be proud that Pakistani are more moderate conservative lot. If you look at Lebenon, Turkey and other they are also muslims but everything goes. I dont remember normal middle class Pakistanis to be so much out of the way form Islam.
Everyone knows it’s not Islam its all dirty politics by these students. There are millions of way to serve Islam! They just need to open a book instead or learning how to use a weapon!
I am happy that Musharraf has left. he was only interested in his personal power as others have said and did nothing for the country. Only for himself to the very end. He also destroyed teh Army image. Now no one respects the army. which is why he is most unpopular amongst our jawans.
The real victory here is of democracy.
As others say this is a lesson to dictators. Their way is to kill people and put them in jail. In thsi case people pressure forced a dictator out.
Feels good to be a Pakistani today.