Her Majesty's G.G.

PAKISTAN Her Majesty's G.G. In Pakistan, which has no constitution, real power resides in the hands of a little clique of soldier-administrators and Moslem League politicians. The able among them have created a strong army and a strong foreign policy on the side of the West; but the corrupt among them have badly discredited the regime at home.

Nine months ago Her Majesty's Governor General Ghulam Mohammed, 59, faced with unrest and growing opposition, took it on himself to reduce amiable Premier Mohammed Ali to the stature of a front man and began to rule with a set of decrees which the Pakistan High Court has since challenged. But wanting to be strong, Ghulam Mohammed found his own body weak. Paralyzed by a series of strokes, and unable to speak clearly, last week he agreed to step down from the governor generalship.

The man who replaced him, Major General Iskandar Mirza, is a blunt soldier who believes his people ready only for a "controlled democracy." Descended from one of the great Mogul families of India, and the son of a wealthy Bengal landowner, Mirza is a Moslem aristocrat and autocrat. Says he bluntly: "Democracy requires breeding. Pakistan is not ripe for democracy. These illiterate peasants certainly know less about running a country than I do." Mirza joined India's raj, or ruling class, when the British sent him to Sandhurst military college in 1918. There he got to be a crack rifle shot and earned his cricket "blue."; Gazetted an officer in the British army, he fought with the Cameronians (2nd Scottish Rifles) at Kohat in 1921 and with the 17th Poona Horse in Waziristan in 1924. He was Britain's top policeman in the Khyber Pass area for 20 years before becoming Joint Secretary of the Indian Government Defense Ministry at New Delhi, and, after the partition of India, Pakistan's first Defense Secretary.

At 55, Mirza. a whisky drinker and a heavy cigarette smoker, loathes intrigue and is staunchly loyal to those who trust him. Says he of Pakistan's politicians: "They are mostly crooks and scalawags." Last year when, as Governor of East Bengal, he worked titanically amid the flood disaster and was mobbed by genuinely cheering crowds, a Pakistani said: "Mirza has done more for the common man whom he says he despises than all the politicians who promised a new heaven and earth to get votes." Today Mirza lives in a big house with ample grounds and cool white porticos in the center of Karachi with his second wife, a sophisticated Persian.* Mirza's appointment to the governor generalship requires the formal confirmation of Queen Elizabeth, but Strongman Mirza is in no doubt about what his authority will give him. Said he: "The Governor General must have extensive and clearly defined powers, including the power to dismiss governments." Mirza's first job was to accept the resignation of Premier Mohammed Ali. The Premier did not want to quit, but the Moslem League, in an all-night session, removed him as its leader. Rebuffed by his party, Ali gave up the premiership too.

* Humayun, a son by Mirza's first wife, from whom he is now separated, last year married Josephine Wing Hildreth (Vassar '54), daughter of the U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Horace A. Hildreth.

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