We want Growing pakistan........

American writer Nicholas Schmidle wrote the
following comments in his article published on 30 April 2009 in The
Daily Beast, a Web publication based in New York

Amid a fresh surge of violence in Pakistan, a Karachi playboy and accused murderer, became our ally, and his days are numbered.

Pakistani President Zardari relishes politics behind closed doors. But as his Army continues to battle in northwest Pakistan with fighter jets, air-dropped commandos and helicopter gunships, Zardari has been keeping an exceptionally low profile.

Even though the military has reclaimed some of the territory
overrun by the last week in Buner district, civilians have been displaced, and there is a nasty ethnic conflict festering in Karachi that has already left dead. If part of a President’s job is to guarantee the
safety of his people, Zardari is having an awful time of it these
days.

But Zardari’s office issued just one vacuous, disingenuous statement,
declaring that military action was only “one aspect of the solution”
and that his government “will not succumb to any pressure from the militants.” On the first part, he is right: Military efforts to crush the are only likely to breathe life into the insurgency. On the second
point, however, he is just bluffing: The fact is that Zardari’s
government – and Musharraf’s before that – have already succumbed in northwest Pakistan.

Zardari is, in many ways, a fluke president. Twenty years ago, he
married Benazir Bhutto and was lifted from relative obscurity into
Pakistan’s most powerful political dynasty. A Karachi socialite and
playboy who had reportedly turned his basement into a disco, Zardari stabled his polo horses at the Prime Minister’s official residence during Bhutto’s first term in office. Meanwhile, he earned
the nickname “Mr Ten Percent” for the kickback he purportedly took on government contracts. Zardari would spend most of
his marriage in prison on charges ranging from corruption to murdering his brother-in-law Murtaza Bhutto. Though never convicted, he has always carried a certain, well, unsavory reputation as a crooked, back-room operator. Zardari wouldn’t remain in the shadows forever.

But Zardari shared something – a certain nemesis – with Musharraf. In
2007, Musharraf had sacked the chief Justice of the Supreme
Court, twice as Chaudhry’s court prepared to declare Musharraf’s re-election bid unconstitutional. Thousands of lawyers, and tens of thousands of their supporters, massed in the streets to demand the rule of law and an independent judiciary. The street protests weakened Musharraf and resulted in his downfall. Zardari took power in September 2008 promising to restore Chaudhry. But he had his own beef with Chaudhry over past corruption cases, so Zardari deliberated. Pakistanis lost any trust in him and the lawyers returned in numbers. This time, they pledged to topple Zardari. In March 2009, Zardari conceded and returned Chaudhry to his bench. But he had already squandered every ounce of popularity that he – or the PPP – once had.

For Pakistan to wage a successful counterinsurgency against the
government needs two things: the support of the people and the Army. A poll conducted in January 2009 showed Zardari’s approval rating at 19 percent. And while cutting deals in the halls of power might have worked for some, the Pakistani military seems less impressed by his connivance. When the PPP-led government tried to exert control over the ISI, the military flat out refused, forcing Zardari and the PPP to back off.

“Some very serious differences at the highest level in Islamabad had
been spectacularly laid bare within the space of a few hours,” said an
editorial the next day in The News. It appeared that there were more
than just divisions between the government and the Army, the lawyers, the “Taliban”, the intelligence agencies, Afghanistan and India. They now existed within the civilian leadership itself.

Critics of Musharraf used to deride him whenever he bombarded the
people, and categorize the operations as part of “Musharraf’s War.” Zardari has fallen into many of the same traps – mainly the public perception of doing America’s bidding – but few people call Zardari’s sporadic operations “Zardari’s war.” That would be almost giving him too much credit and control. When Musharraf was recently asked by a reporter to reflect on his tenure, he confessed to have resigned last summer because he feared being “impotent.” Despite his playboy past, Zardari may find himself proclaiming impotence soon too.

Mr Nicholas Schmidle, who lived in Pakistan from 2006 to 2008, is a
fellow at the New America Foundation (NAF) and author of his book, To Live or to Perish Forever – Two Tumultuous Years in Pakistan, which was published in May 2009.