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COVERSTORY: INDO-PAK SPECIAL
THE MAN IN GENERAL
His mother, sweets, tennis and picking people's brains—just
a few of his favourite things
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CANINE COMFORT: A presidential pastime
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Pakistan, it seems,
has finally found a leader who cares. And one apparently unafraid of the
strident lobby of religious heads who have always held the country's government
to ransom with their regressive notions of what constitutes Islamic and
unIslamic behaviour. President Pervez Musharraf did not mince words when
he declared the chief of the Jamaat-e-Islami, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, to be
an "unbalanced man". He even reprimanded his pr people for trying
to retract the statement on his behalf. "I told them, 'Never cover
up for me,'" says the general.
Even in the unrelenting environment of the army,
Musharraf always found ways to be the Outsider. He was known for his defiance
and says, "People wonder how I made it to the top." The answer
lies in the fact that the chief executive enjoyed the bravado and camaraderie
of his job enough to first train as a commando and later to train commandos,
devising novel and increasingly risky exercises for his troops. Yet, "I
was always loved by my subordinates. I knew their problems," he says.
Not surprisingly then, on October 12, 1999, it was General Pervez Musharraf
and not General Ziauddin to whom the Pakistan Army pledged allegiance
in the counter-coup against prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
"He is a reluctant coupmaker," explains
Begum Zarreen Musharraf, the President's mother and loudest cheerleader.
"But Pervez cannot take anything lying down." As a child, she
says, her son was headstrong and very attached to her. "He would
take me to task if I came home late. He would cry bitterly." "I
was quite a nuisance," adds Musharraf apologetically.
What Musharraf is not apologetic about is what
he calls being "comfortable with myself." He says, "A shallow
man or one who lacks self-confidence will change his laughter or the way
he walks. I do whatever I feel like. If I see a cute child and want to
pull his cheeks, I pull his cheeks!" Easily said and done by the
General but not quite as comfortably digested by his staff. "Security
wale pareshaan ho jaate hain (the security guards get exasperated),"
he says with a naughty grin. Then, as though suddenly realising the obvious,
he adds, "The higher you go, the lonelier you become."
Musharraf says he taught himself the art of
discretion only after he became director-general, military operations
in 1993. "I learned to absorb and keep quiet. I had to take decisions,
an extremely heavy burden I couldn't share with anyone. But I do believe
that sometimes it's good to share because otherwise you feel so alone.
Although I always make up my mind, I like to pick the minds of people."
The same people who make the general in his
home a stress-free, jovial man. Playing a game of tennis with his ADCs.
Gently instructing his cook to go easy on the oil while deepfrying fish.
Or saying, "I've put on too much weight,"glancing down at his
midriff and then reaching out for a balu shahi, a sweetmeat, that has
arrived to announce the engagement of a friend's daughter. After devouring
three quarters of the flaky, doughnut-shaped sweet, he tells me, "I've
left the rest for you."
—Saher Ali
(The author is a Karachi-based journalist)
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