When Pervaiz Elahi who, judging by his anti-PPP tirades, seems to be getting more desperate by the hour, arrived in Talagang on Nov. 26 to file his nomination papers he got the protocol befitting a mansabdar of the Punjab. From Balkassar on the Motorway up to Talagang the police were lined up to pay him due homage.

The Musharraf order, whatever brave front it puts on, is in mourning because the uniform which was its mightiest emblem now adorns another person.

But in the fullness of its powers, two kinds of civilian puppets stood with it, cheering it on and hailing its achievements: the district nazims and the drumbeaters of the Q League. Ample funds and local powers were with the nazims, who now are moving heaven and earth on behalf of the Q League’s sad-faced candidates in this election.

The entire election process, from filing of nomination papers to the declaration of the results, is overseen by the subordinate judiciary. Without independent judges how is it possible even to contemplate free elections? After the havoc wrought by the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO), we know the state the judiciary is in. Yet having acquiesced in the games which saw General Musharraf getting himself ‘elected’ president, the opposition parties have left themselves with no choice except to participate in the heavily-loaded affair which lies ahead.

But the dangers lurking on this road are pretty obvious. Prediction about other things may be difficult but about one thing we can be reasonably certain. On the evening of Jan. 8, much before all the results are in, a great cry will go up across the land accusing the government of a historic act of rigging. Far from settling anything, the election will open fresh wounds.

Why are all the blinds pulled down so completely in the Presidency? Why are its denizens, psychologically besieged behind those frightened walls, so cocooned from reality? A tainted election is the last thing Pakistan needs or wants at this juncture yet it is towards a tainted election that we seem to be marching. The Presidency is living in a world of its own. On the mind of its chief resident rests neither the burden of posterity nor history. Self-preservation is the only wisdom holding sway behind those worried walls.

The ‘wasteland’ looks set to be the final title given to the Musharraf years: an opportunity squandered. Yet the shorn-of-his-locks president could still find some honourable mention in history’s footnotes — alas, in a crowded book the only space available — if, in the twilight of his powers (and we know how fast the shadows are closing in), he can bring himself to conduct elections reasonably free and fair.

This requires all the instincts honed during the last eight years. And that is why a sudden change of heart is so impossible. The second half of a man’s life, says Dostoyevsky in The Possessed, is merely a continuation of the first half. Radical departures are a virtue of youth, not declining evening. Musharraf can only be what he was. Destiny’s lines are written. These polls will be what they are and when the tocsin sounds on Jan. 8 we will be into another crisis.

Ayaz, a columnist with Dawn, writes for THT from Islamabad