Musharraf's turbulent 9 years in power

[August 18, 2008]  ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) -- Pervez Musharraf, the Pakistani president who took power in a high-altitude coup and later dragged a reluctant Islamic nation into the U.S.-led war on terror, submitted his resignation Monday after a turbulent nine years in office.

The former military commando's decision to side with Washington after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks earned Western plaudits and an injection of much-needed aid that helped rescue Pakistan from bankruptcy and the status of an international pariah.

But that alliance also triggered an explosion in Islamic militancy in his homeland. Combined with his fumbled efforts to stay in power as democracy returned to Pakistan, he leaves the presidency now reviled by many of his countrymen.

His demise was as tortured as his arrival was swift.

Musharraf yielded on Monday to months of immense political pressure from bitter rivals who swept February elections. Facing the humiliation of impeachment, in what would have been a first for Pakistan, Musharraf chose to go -- but not without a last burst of the defiant self-confidence that marked his long domination of the country.

"They want to impeach me now. Why do they want to do it?" a downcast Musharraf said in a televised address in which he denied any wrongdoing. "Do they want to cover their failure?"

Musharraf, an urbane special forces veteran, seized power in a 1999 coup from then-prime minister, Nawaz Sharif.

Sharif had ordered Musharraf's dismissal as the army chief was flying home from a visit to Sri Lanka and denied his plane landing rights in Pakistan, even as it ran low on fuel. On the ground, the army seized control, and Musharraf took over, promising to install "true" democracy.

While few doubted he wanted a stable, religiously moderate Pakistan, his commitment to democracy was shaky. His popularity plummeted in 2007, when he declared a state of emergency and sacked independent-minded Supreme Court judges who could have barred his re-election.

He was widely credited with seeking peace with rival India. While a lasting solution to the core dispute over Kashmir remains elusive, the dialogue dramatically reduced the chance of a cataclysmic future conflict.

Musharraf, who described his military uniform as his "second skin," led Pakistan's army for nine years and only ceded control in late 2007. He often harked back to his time as a commando and was famously unruffled by two huge al-Qaida bombings against him within 11 days in December 2003 in which he escaped injury.

Born August 11, 1943, in New Delhi, India, the middle son of a diplomat, Musharraf's family joined millions of other Muslims in migrating westward when predominantly Hindu India and Islamic Pakistan split during independence from Britain in 1947. Riots and fighting left hundreds of thousands dead.

In the army, Musharraf said he was almost court-martialed for indiscipline but was saved by his bravery during Pakistan's second war with India.

He spent seven years in the elite Special Services Group and rose through the ranks, but was relatively unknown when Sharif promoted him over two other generals to army chief in 1998.

The next year, he masterminded a military operation at Kargil, the first Pakistani push into the Indian-held part of Kashmir since the 1971 war. The offensive nearly brought the nuclear neighbors to a new conflict.

Musharraf's relationship with Sharif grew tense after the prime minister agreed to withdraw the Pakistani troops.

The coup that brought Musharraf to power was bloodless and widely welcomed in Pakistan. Sharif, meanwhile, was convicted of hijacking and sentenced to life imprisonment, but agreed in 2000 to go into exile in Saudi Arabia. He only returned last year, vowing political revenge. His party is now the second-largest in the ruling coalition.

After Sept. 11, 2001, Musharraf faced a bleak choice. Pakistan had been instrumental in the rise of the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan in the mid-1990s.

Despite fears of a backlash in Pakistan, Musharraf threw his lot in with the United States, earning more than $10 billion in aid for the near-bankrupt country in the years that followed.

The decision enraged Islamic hard-liners, and al-Qaida called for Pakistanis to "uproot" Musharraf. He escaped at least three reported assassination attempts between 2002 and 2003.

He held flawed elections in late 2002, and only after changing the constitution to give himself sweeping powers to sack the prime minister and Parliament. He then reneged on a promise to stand down as army chief by the end of 2004.

But Musharraf could not shake off doubts about his legitimacy as president. Fearing the judiciary would block his continued rule, he fired the Supreme Court chief justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry in 2007, triggering a mass movement by lawyers against military rule.

When the chief justice was reinstated by the court and the opposition grew in strength, Musharraf declared a state of emergency and replaced Chaudhry and other independent-minded justices.

While he struggled to manage domestic political affairs, pro-Taliban and al-Qaida militants were asserting control over vast tracts of Pakistan's northwestern frontier and launching a series of shocking suicide attacks on key political figures -- former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto among them.

Under pressure at home and abroad to restore civilian rule, Musharraf stepped down as army chief, but rejected repeated calls to resign the presidency, saying his rule was crucial to the country's survival during one of the most turbulent eras in its history.

Though he won another five-year term, Musharraf faced a major national crisis following Bhutto's assassination in December, with opposition supporters demanding he resign for not protecting her and taking to the streets with chants of "Musharraf, killer." Musharraf's government blamed Islamic militants.

After his opponents won the February parliamentary elections, Musharraf found himself largely sidelined. The army, his former power base, said it wanted to avoid interfering in the political scene. And as the months have worn on, the U.S. has also toed a tricky line, not disavowing Musharraf while trying to develop relations with the new civilian leaders.

In his personal life, Musharraf has a reputation for being something of a bon vivant. He likes good food, traditional Pakistani music, Urdu poetry and fine clothes. He is known to enjoy dancing to Western music at parties. He once faced criticism at home when he was photographed with his two pet dogs -- animals considered impure in Islam.

[Associated Press; By MATTHEW PENNINGTON]

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