© T. MUGHAL/EPA A vehicle transporting former President and military strongman Pervez Musharraf, leaves Islamabad High Court after the court ordered his arrest, in Islamabad, on April 18, 2013.
Pervez Musharraf, an unlikely candidate for Pakistan's prime minister and certainly the country's only former military ruler to have appeared twice on Jon Stewart's talk show, took political theater to a new level Thursday with a wild flight from justice that transfixed the nation and ended with the fugitive holed up in his farmhouse savoring a cigar.
The weird saga began with Musharraf, who seized power in a 1999 coup and strode the world stage as Pakistan's top general and president for nine years, appearing in an Islamabad court to face treason charges related to his tenure in office. The case centers on his imposition of emergency rule in November 2007, when he placed scores of judges under house arrest, deposed the chief justice of the Supreme Court and sparked protests that eventually ended with his self-exile.
Hearing the case Thursday, Islamabad High Court Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui essentially declared Musharraf a terrorist, revoked his bail and ordered him arrested. It was the latest setback for the former ruler, who returned home with great bravado last month to run in
a historic general election next month, with the proclaimed goal of saving his troubled nation.
Arresting and confining judges "is not an ordinary act, rather it is an act of terrorism," Siddiqui wrote in his order. "This shameful act lowered the honor, prestige and status of the country" in the eyes of the international community, he added.
Rather than turning himself in, Musharraf retreated to an armored sport-utility vehicle, which took off with a member of his security detail hanging on to its side. Only days before, the former strongman had vowed that he was not afraid to face jail or death for returning to Pakistan.