In her article ‘Pakistan’s Governance Deficit’, published on July 8th Maleeha Lodhi has tried to build up an argument against the governing practices of the present elected government. The argument she makes is not new. It has been made by supporters of military-technocrat rule time and again in relation to every elected civilian government that has followed a dictatorial regime.

Ms Lodhi herself points out that issues of governance are not new to Pakistan. She also acknowledges the conditions under which the present coalition government assumed office. Not only is the government faced with the mess created by the previous regime of former General Pervez Musharraf, it inherited a backlog of difficult economic problems as well as rising international oil and food prices and the affects of the global financial crunch.