Zia-ul-Haq
Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq was a Pakistani military officer and politician who served as the sixth president of Pakistan from 1978 until his death in an airplane crash in 1988. He also served as the second chief of the army staff of the Pakistan Army from 1976 until his death. The country's longest-serving de facto head of state and chief of the army staff, Zia's political ideology is known as Ziaism.
Born in Jalandhar, Punjab, Zia was trained at the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun and fought in the Second World War under the British Indian Army. Following the partition of India in 1947, he joined the Pakistan Army as a part of the Frontier Force Regiment. Zia was on active duty in Kashmir during the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, and after it he was promoted to colonel. During Black September, he played a prominent role as an advisor of the Jordanian Armed Forces against the Palestine Liberation Organization. In 1976, Zia was elevated to the rank of general and was appointed as chief of the army staff by Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, succeeding Tikka Khan. In July 1977, Zia organized Operation Fair Play, in which he overthrew Bhutto's federal government, declared martial law and assumed the office of the chief martial law administrator, dissolved the federal and provincial legislatures—hence suspending the provincial governments as well and declaring governor's rule across all provinces—and suspended the constitution. The coup was the second in Pakistan's history.
Zia remained de facto leader for over a year, assuming the presidency in September 1978, after Fazal Ilahi Chaudhry resigned. He directed a policy of Islamisation in Pakistan, escalated the country's atomic bomb project and instituted industrialisation and deregulation, which significantly improved Pakistan's economy. In 1979, following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Zia adopted an anti-Soviet stance and aided the Afghan mujahideen. He bolstered ties with China and the United States, and emphasised Pakistan's role in the Islamic world. Zia held non-partisan elections in 1985 and appointed Muhammad Khan Junejo prime minister, though he accumulated more presidential powers through the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution. He dismissed Junejo's government on charges of economic stagflation and announced a general election in November 1988. However, on August 1988, while travelling from Bahawalpur to Islamabad, Zia died in an aircraft crash near the Sutlej River. He is buried at the Faisal Mosque in Islamabad.
Zia dominated Pakistan's politics for over a decade and his proxy war against the Soviet Union is credited with leading to the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. He is praised by right-wing conservatives for his desecularisation efforts and opposition to Western culture. Conversely, Zia's detractors criticise his authoritarianism, his press censorship, his purported religious intolerance, his suppression of women's rights by Hudood Ordinance, and his weakening of democracy in Pakistan.
Early life and education
Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq was born on 12 August 1924 in Jullundur, Punjab, British India. His father, Muhammad Akbar Ali, worked in the Army General Headquarters in Delhi. Ali was noted for his religiousness which earned him the Muslim clerical title of maulvi. His family belonged to the Arain community of Punjabis. At an early age, Zia and his six siblings were taught the Qur'an.After completing his initial education in Shimla, Zia attended Delhi's prestigious St. Stephen's College, an Anglican missionary school, for his bachelor's degree in history, from which he graduated with distinction in 1943. He was admitted to the Indian Military Academy at Dehradun, graduating in May 1945 among the last group of officers to be commissioned before the independence of India.
Military service
Early career and partition
Zia was commissioned into the British Indian Army on 12 May 1943 after graduating from the Mhow Officer Training School. He was posted to the 13th Lancers, a cavalry unit accoutered with tanks. During the Second World War, in May 1945, Zia participated in the Burma campaign and the Malayan campaign of the Pacific War against the Imperial Japanese Army. Image:Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq with his father.jpg|thumb|right|Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq with his father in 1929|261x261pxZia also participated in Indonesian National Revolution and the Battle of Surabaya.Following the Partition of India in 1947, Zia was the escort officer for the last train of refugees to leave Babina, an armoured corps training centre in Uttar Pradesh, a difficult journey that took seven days, during which the passengers were under constant fire due to communal violence which broke out in the aftermath of the Partition.
After the partition, Zia joined the Pakistan Army, In September 1950, he joined the Guides Cavalry. He was trained in the United States from 1962–1964 at the United States Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. After that, he returned to take over as Directing Staff at Command and Staff College, Quetta. During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Zia is said to have been the Assistant Quartermaster of the 101st Infantry Brigade.. In 1969 he raised the 9th Armoured Brigade in Kharian as the first Brigade Commander of the unit; the brigade is currently stationed in Gujranwala under the 6th Armoured Division.
As a young soldier, Zia preferred prayers when "drinking, gambling, dancing and music were the way officers spent their free time."
Role in Black September
Zia was stationed in Jordan from 1967 to 1970 as the head of a Pakistani training mission to Jordan. He later became involved as an advisor for the Jordanians during the Black September against the Palestinian Liberation Organization. Zia had been stationed in Amman for three years prior to Black September. During the events, according to CIA official Jack O'Connell, Zia was dispatched by Hussein north to assess Syria's military capabilities. The Pakistani commander reported back to Hussein, recommending the deployment of a RJAF squadron to the region. According to Pakistani journalist Raja Anwar, the mission may have been a violation of Zia's original assignment in Jordan by the Pakistani military, even though it helped Jordan repel the Syrian offensive. Hussein came to view Zia favourably, and later convinced Pakistani president Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to appoint him as Chief of Army Staff. O'Connell also said that Zia personally led Jordanian troops during the battles.Ascent to Chief of Army Staff
He was then promoted as lieutenant general and was appointed commander of the II Corps at Multan in 1975. On 1 March 1976, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto approved then-three star rank general Lieutenant General Zia to Chief of Army Staff and to be elevated to four-star rank.At the time of his nomination as the successor to the outgoing chief of army staff, General Tikka Khan, the lieutenant generals in order of seniority were: Muhammad Shariff, Akbar Khan, Aftab Ahmed, Azmat Baksh Awan, Ibrahim Akram, Abdul Majeed Malik, Ghulam Jilani Khan, and Zia himself. Bhutto chose the most junior, superseding seven more senior lieutenant-generals. However, the senior most at that time, Lieutenant General Mohammad Shariff, though promoted to General, was made the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee.
Pakistani academic Husain Haqqani argues that Bhutto chose Zia ahead of many senior officers for ethnic and caste reasons, thinking that an Arain would not make an alliance with the predominantly Pashtun and Rajput military officers in order to overthrow him, and this is also the reason why he let Zia push for more Islam in the armed forces. Thus, Bhutto let him change the army's motto to Iman and let him offer books of Abul A'la Maududi, an Islamic scholar and critic of Bhutto, to his officers as prizes during various competitions, despite the strong ideological antagonism between Bhutto and Zia.
Military coup
Pre-coup unrest
Bhutto began facing considerable criticism and increasing unpopularity as his term progressed; the alliance of socialists in Pakistan who had previously allied with Bhutto began to diminish as time progressed. Bhutto also targeted opposition leader Abdul Wali Khan and his party the National Awami Party. Despite the socialistic ideological similarity of the two parties as, the clash of egos between the two men became increasingly fierce, starting with the Bhutto government's decision to oust the NAP provincial government in Balochistan for alleged secessionist activities and subsequent banning of the NAP with the arrest of much of its leadership after the death of a close lieutenant of Bhutto's, Hayat Sherpao, in a bomb blast in the frontier town of Peshawar.Dissidence also increased within Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party, and the murder of leading dissident Ahmed Raza Kasuri's father led to public outrage and intra-party hostility because Bhutto was accused of masterminding the crime. PPP leaders such as Ghulam Mustafa Khar openly condemned Bhutto and called for protests against his regime. The political crisis in the North-West Frontier Province and Balochistan intensified as civil liberties remained suspended, and an estimated 100,000 troops deployed in the two provinces were accused of abusing human rights and killing large numbers of civilians.
On 8 January 1977, a large number of opposition political parties grouped to form the Pakistan National Alliance. Bhutto called fresh elections, and the PNA participated fully to ouster Bhutto. The PNA managed to contest the elections jointly even though there were grave splits on opinions and views within the alliance. The PNA faced defeat but did not accept the results, alleging that the election was rigged. On 11 March 1977, the alliance called a nationwide strike followed by vicious demonstrations demanding fresh elections. Around 200 people were killed in the encounters between protestors and security forces. They proceeded to boycott the provincial elections. Despite this, there was a high voter turnout in the national elections; however, as provincial elections were held amidst low voter turnout and an opposition boycott, the PNA viewed Bhutto's government as illegitimate.
Soon, all the opposition leaders called for the overthrow of Bhutto's regime. Political and civil disorder intensified, which led to more unrest. On 21 April 1977, Bhutto imposed martial law in the major cities of Karachi, Lahore and Hyderabad. However, a compromise agreement between Bhutto and opposition was ultimately reported. Zia planned the Coup d'état carefully as he knew Bhutto had integral intelligence in the Pakistan Armed Forces, and many officers, including chief of air staff Air Marshal Zulfiqar Ali Khan, Major General Tajammul Hussain Malik, Major General Naseerullah Babar, and Vice Admiral Syed Mohammad Ahsan, were all loyal to Bhutto.