I firmly believe that military dictatorship is the worst form of government, perhaps second only to religious dictatorship, as it destroys the various institutions of the state at the altar of the military. Pakistan's own experience of tinpot military dictators has been devastating for the country. These dictators invariably left the country in a mess. The intermittent but prolonged military rule in the country has retarded the growth of democratic institutions and has been responsible directly or indirectly for most of the national disasters. Musharraf's nine-year military rule was no exception. The nation is still suffering from the after effects of his flawed political, security and economic policies. Therefore, like the rest of the nation I rejoiced over the overwhelming rejection of the King's party by the people at the last year's general election and heartily welcomed the subsequent restoration of the democratic set-up in the country. It was the hope of the nation that our political leaders had learnt the right lessons from their experience and would avoid repeating their past mistakes so as to guide the nation on the path of true democracy, prosperity and security for the common man. Unfortunately, the PPP-led government at the centre has been a great disappointment over the past one and a half years. What one has witnessed during this period is an acute leadership crisis in the government which has prevented it from coming to grips with the pressing political, economic and security challenges facing the nation. A successful leader must fulfil three essential requirements. Firstly, he must have a vision of the future direction that the nation must take and the goals that it must aim at. For this, the leader must have a deep comprehension of the historical and cultural ethos of his nation, and an understanding of the regional and international environment within which he has to operate. Secondly, he must be able to inspire the nation through persuasion and personal conduct to follow him in pursuit of the goals that he has set for the nation. Thirdly, he must have the organisational skills to guide the government machinery in the realisation of the national aims and objectives through the adoption of appropriate policies in various fields with the support of the nation and with the help of good advisers and an efficient bureaucracy. Judged by these standards, the government led by President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani hardly gets passing marks. No wonder there is a pervasive feeling in the country that the ship of the state is rudderless and that those at the helm of affairs lack both the comprehension of the pressing problems confronting the country and the ability to handle them successfully. It took this government about a year to resolve the judicial crisis which could have been settled in March last year when it was voted into office. In the process, it wasted precious political capital and failed to focus on the urgent political, economic and security issues awaiting its attention. As for the repeal of the seventeenth constitutional amendment to which both the PPP and the PML-N had agreed under the Charter of Democracy, all that has been accomplished so far is the formation of a Parliamentary Committee. One notices from the discordant voices coming from the spokespersons of the PPP a definite hesitation to move towards this goal on which there is a virtual national consensus. As for the economy, it is true that the Musharraf-Shaukat Aziz government because of gross mismanagement passed on to the present government serious problems like the energy crisis, a cleverly concealed massive budget deficit to overload the succeeding democratic government, an unsustainable external trade imbalance, high rates of unemployment, inflation and poverty, and badly neglected social and physical infrastructure. The situation called for innovative changes in economic policies to rectify the situation. Instead what one has witnessed is mediocrity in the handling of the economic crisis. The same mediocrity was on display again in the latest lacklustre budget presented by the PPP-led government. The energy crisis does not show any sign of subsiding. The breakdown of the Mangla Dam power plant, which has further reduced the power supply, reflects criminal neglect and plain inefficiency on the part of WAPDA for which some heads should have rolled. The masses continue to suffer from grinding poverty and high rates of inflation and unemployment. The past neglect of education, health and physical infrastructure continues. There are no signs of any serious effort on the part of the government to revive the industry which had been badly affected by the previous government's flawed policies and has been further hit by the power shortage. In short, the condition of the economy remains gloomy. Above all, the present leadership at the helm of the nation's affairs has failed to present to the people in a persuasive manner its vision of the country's future destiny perhaps because it lacks a comprehension of the national and international affairs and its personal conduct does not inspire confidence among the people. Faced with the serious challenges and problems confronting the nation, the first instinct of our current leaders is to take a plane loaded of their cronies to Washington or the capital of another developed country in pursuit of their begging bowl diplomacy. They apparently see no harm in travelling and staying abroad in luxurious style while on these begging trips. This is not a very inspiring conduct on the part of the present leadership. (Musharraf was no exception either.) A leadership with some sense of honour would instead rely on the policy of self-reliance in tackling the national problems. But such an honourable course of action involves painful sacrifices for which our leaders are simply not ready. Apparently they believe that the job of leaders is to have good time together with their cronies as long as it lasts. People willingly follow a leader when he empathises with them both in speech and actual style of living. It is disgusting to see the luxurious style of living of our ruling elite against the background of the pervasive poverty from which the country suffers. The people might tolerate even the luxurious style of living of our leadership if it delivers in the form of good policies and efficient administration. Even here the present leadership badly fails because it has surrounded itself with dead wood in the form of advisers whose time has long past and who in addition are tainted with allegations of corruption. The principle of merit in running the affairs of the state has been the first casualty under the present leadership with predictably disastrous consequences. Cronyism, which was the hallmark of Musharraf's rule starting with his prime minister of choice, Shaukat Aziz, continues to be the order of the day also under the present PPP-led government at the centre. The latest example of the disregard of the principles of merit and specialisation is the appointment of a mid-ranking officer currently serving as the secretary (Livestock) in the Punjab government as the new Pakistan Ambassador to France, a post which by any criteria deserves the services of a senior professional of the Foreign Service of Pakistan whose members are trained and groomed for such assignments. This decision reflects the casual attitude of the present leadership towards issues of foreign policy which has been reduced by it to the despicable art of begging and borrowing internationally rather than the serious business of the management of Pakistan's external relations in the service of the nation's best short-term and long-term political, security and economic interests. The same non-serious approach is evident in the government's handling of security issues such as terrorism. This attitude does not bode well for the country's future and the sooner the present government adopts the necessary corrective steps the better it would be for the nation. One had hoped that the PPP leadership had learnt the right lessons from its past experience. It must remember that those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it. The writer is a retired ambassador E-mail: javid.husain@gmail.com