The dailies accused Musharraf of targeting the independent-minded judiciary and media.
Pakistan’s leading dailieson Sunday, November 4, fired a fusillade of attacks at President Pervez Musharraf’s decision to impose emergency rule, suspend the constitution and sack the top judge. "So we are back to square one. Back to October 12, 1999," read the headline of the daily Dawn, referring to the military coup that brought Musharraf to power eight years ago.
"All the gains over the years have gone down the drain," said the English-language daily, which was set up by Pakistan’s founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah.
"The people have been cheated."
Musharraf declared a state of emergency and suspended the constitution blaming that on terrorism and the Supreme Court’s interventions.
After the Supreme Court ordered the suspension of emergency rule, he sacked Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry and appointed a replacement.
Police and security forces have rounded up the country’s leading opposition leaders, except former premier Benazir Bhutto.
Musharraf also imposed sweeping reporting curbs that ban any coverage "that defames, and brings into ridicule or disrepute the head of state" on pain of up to three years’ jail.
The Dawn rejected Musharraf’s claims he was fighting terrorism.
"No one is going to accept what he is going to tell us, neither the people of Pakistan, nor the aid-givers," said the Dawn.
"Can a general who does not enjoy the people’s mandate really carry the nation along and fight terrorism alone?"
The state of emergency also throws into doubt parliamentary elections slated for January, as well as a Washington-brokered power-sharing deal between Musharraf and former premier Benazir Bhutto.
Bhutto told Britain’s Sky News television that the country was regressing towards greater dictatorship.
Former premier Nawaz Sharif, who was ousted by Musharraf in the 1999 coup, asked him to step down, warning that Pakistan was heading towards chaos.
Black Saturday
The News, another English-language newspaper, dubbed the declaration of an emergency "Black Saturday".
"November 3 will go down as another dark day in Pakistan’s political and constitutional history," it said in an editorial.
"It can be safely said that this is one of General Pervez Musharraf’s gravest errors of judgment, and a sorry indication that nothing has been learnt from the mistakes of the past."
The paper also questioned the move would enhance anti-terror efforts.
"Such a draconian step will also give little effect on our ability to fight terrorism and extremism."
The paper said Musharraf targeted the judiciary worried about an impending Supreme Court ruling on the legality of his re-election on October 6.
The Supreme Court was still deciding whether he was eligible to run for reelection in October while still serving as army chief.
"He has sent the country into a tailspin just to save his job," the Nation said.
"It would be fair to assume that emergency has been imposed only to target two institutions: the judiciary and the media."
Private television channels were blacked out on Saturday and Sunday, leaving only state television on air showing re-runs of Musharraf’s late night address to the nation and advertisements promoting the government.
The Daily Times went further.
"We have a state of martial law, whatever the government may say and however long it may last," it said.
"We should expect the lawyers, civil society groups and most, but not all, the opposition parties to launch a spirited protest on the streets and boycott the courts," it added.
"We should also expect a surge of terrorist activities and bomb blasts by Taliban and al Qaeda elements to take advantage of the situation."
Crackdown
Scores of opposition leaders and activists have been detained. Anticipating a possible uprising by opposition activists and the masses, authorities have arrested or held under house arrest almost all leading opposition figures, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Javed Hashmi, the acting chief of former premier Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N party, was arrested in a raid on his house in the central city of Multan.
"I am neither afraid of prison nor of generals because I have served the major part of my political life in prison," he told reporters outside his home.
Hashmi was freed by the independent-minded Supreme Court in July after three years in jail after being slapped with a 23-year term in 2004 on treason charges for criticizing the army.
Khawaja Asif, a firebrand central leader of the party, was also placed under house arrest.
Nationalist opposition leaders Mehmood Khan Achakzai and Qadir Magsi were detained in their home towns in southern Pakistan.
The president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Aitzaz Ahsan, and other legal leaders including Munir A. Malik, Ali Ahmad Kurd and Tariq Mehmood were taken into custody.
The four were counsels for Chief Justice Chaudhry when Musharraf first tried to sack him in March.
The police also picked up five lawyers from southwestern Quetta, who were known as staunch supporters of Chaudhry.
Politician and cricket legend Imran Khan was also placed under house arrest.
"Police entered my house in Lahore and told me that I am placed under house arrest, they did not show me any detention order at all."
Khan, who heads the Movement for Justice Party, is at the forefront of an opposition campaign to dislodge Musharraf.
He had earlier accused Musharraf of high treason for declaring emergency.
"He is a power-grabber and wants to cling to power at all costs."
Lawyers called for a countrywide strike on Monday.
"We are launching our struggle from tomorrow. Lawyers will be observing a strike tomorrow. We will be holding protests and boycotting courts," Hamid Ali Khan, former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, told Reuters on Sunday.
A lawyers movement emerged as the vanguard of an anti-Musharraf campaign after the army chief sacked Chaudhry.