Corruption under Musharraf

As all of us know, Transparancy International is the most well known corruption rating agency worldwide. Overthrows of most civilian governments in the 1990's were justified by referring to this agency's findings. They had rated Pakistan the third most corrupt country in the world in 1996. Musharraf regime made wide use of their findings in projecting a negative image of all political parties and leaderships. It is another matter that he included the most corrupt elements among the civilians in his own governments. Using the same methodology, Transparancy International has claimed in their 2006 report that the Musharraf government (2002-2006) is more corrupt (67%) than PPP's second government (48%) and Nawaz Sharif phase II (34%). Unfortunately, for some strange reason, the mainstream political parties and civil society organizations have not used the data presented in this report the way the military regime had used against the civilian governments. It has been the most frequently used weapon by the military regime to malign civilians and justify continuation of military rule in Pakistan in the last eight years and many supporters of Musharraf in the liberal elite hold the same view. This report presents a very dark picture of corruption in Pakistan under Musharraf. It is high time that civil society organizations expose both institutional and common corruption under the military rulers and break the myth of clean government under them.