The Taliban Shuffle_ Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan - Kim Barker [85]
“Nawaz,” I said. I had somehow slipped into calling the former prime minister by his first name. “You have to hear this.”
I then performed a dramatic reading of the message in full, culminating in the explosive direct quote from the attorney general, recorded the month before Bhutto was killed and just before Sharif flew home:
“Leave Nawaz Sharif … I think Nawaz Sharif will not take part in the election … If he does take part, he will be in trouble. If Benazir takes part she too will be in trouble … They will massively rig to get their own people to win. If you can get a ticket from these guys, take it … If Nawaz Sharif does not return himself, then Nawaz Sharif has some advantage. If he comes himself, even if after the elections rather than before … Yes …”
It was unclear what the other man was saying, but Human Rights Watch said the attorney general appeared to be advising him to leave Sharif’s party and get a ticket from “these guys,” the pro-Musharraf party, the massive vote riggers.
Sharif’s aide stared at me openmouthed. “Is that true? I can’t believe that.”
“It’s from Human Rights Watch,” I said. “There’s apparently a tape recording. Pretty amazing.”
Sharif just looked at me. “How can you get a text message that long on your telephone?”
“It’s an e-mail,” I said, slightly shocked that Sharif was unconcerned about what I had just said. “This is a BlackBerry phone. You can get e-mail on it.”
“Ah, e-mail,” he said. “I must look into this BlackBerry.”
Sharif soon whipped out a comb, pulled the rearview mirror toward him, and combed his hair. I watched, fascinated. His hair plugs were in some ways genius—not enough to actually cover his bald spot but enough to make him seem less bald. He had the perfect hair transplant for a Pakistani politician who wanted to look younger while still appearing like a man of the people. But with every pull of the comb, I counted the potential cost—$1,000, $2,000. At the next speech, Sharif spoke in front of a metal podium with a bulletproof glass screen that ended three inches below the top of his head. I wondered if Musharraf was trying to kill him.
The election was three days away. And as much as Sharif seemed to be slightly simple, he was also increasingly popular, largely because of his support of the deposed judges. While Bhutto’s widower campaigned on the memory of his dead wife, Sharif campaigned against Musharraf and for justice. Bhutto’s party would win the most votes. But I thought Sharif would perform better than anyone suspected.
The day of the election, two journalist friends and I drove to polling stations in Islamabad and neighboring Rawalpindi. Everywhere we heard the same name: Nawaz Sharif. It was rather spooky. At one point, we found a man who had spent the entire night cutting up white blankets, gluing them to his new car, and then painting them with tiger stripes. He finished the project off with black-feather trim.
“What are you going to do if it rains?” I asked the man.
“God willing, it won’t,” he said.
I snapped a photograph with my BlackBerry. By the end of the day, the results were clear—Musharraf’s party had received barely any votes. Secular parties had triumphed over religious ones. Bhutto’s party had won the most seats, as predicted. But Sharif’s party had won the second-highest amount of votes, a surprise to many Western observers. Through the election, Sharif had exacted revenge on Musharraf. And Bhutto’s party needed Sharif to have enough seats to run the country.
After more than eight years of political irrelevance, Sharif was back. I sent him a text message and asked him to call. A few hours later, he did, thrilled with his victory.
“I saw a car today, where a man had glued blankets to it and painted it