POREG VIEW: Retired generals in Pakistan refuse to fade away. They would like to be around and be counted as the messiahs, ignoring the writing on the wall. Pervez Musharraf belongs to the same class.

The problem with him, unlike many of his ilk, is that he is highly opinionated and has solutions by the dozen for every single problem confronting his land of the pure. This is what made him launch his ‘All Pakistan Muslim League’ party in London, with an apology for the mistakes ‘I had committed towards the end of my nine-year rule’.

One such mistake, which really cost him his job as the President of Pakistan was head-on collision with the Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhary. A prominent loyalist at the launch ceremony was Advocate Naim Bukhari. He in fact was the master of the ceremony. It was he who had fired the first shot at the chief justice at the behest of Musharraf as Justice Chaudhary’s activism became too much for the army and ISI in the missing persons case.

This fact alone puts a big question mark on Brand Musharraf, besides the reality that not only People’s Party of Pakistan (PPP), which was the biggest beneficiary of his NRO largesse, but also former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League and other fringe elements are arraigned against him. The Chaudhry’s of Gujrat, who were his main props, when he was searching for political legitimacy seven years ago, are themselves in disarray today.

The 67-year –old former Pak army chief cannot count on the loyalty of the army either. By its ethos, the army is loyal to the present master and not to the past. Musharraf should be aware of the truism because, as the President, he tried to cling on to the army chief’s post as long as he could and his troubles began to manifest right from the day he relinquished the job at the US bidding. More over, many of Musharraf’s close allies in the army and in the intelligence services have since retired.

The one-time Pakistani strongman cannot count on his American friends either. WikiLeaks has clearly brought out Washington’s distrust of its one-time darling.

As Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan’s High Commissioner to Britain, says, Musharraf is yesterday’s man.