To judge by the responses of people whom my assistant and I talked with on the streets of Peshawar this weekend, most Pakistanis will greet the departure of President Pervez Musharraf from office with great satisfaction. Fewer than 10 per cent of those interviewed said he had done a good job even at the start of his rule. The rest said they disliked or even hated Mr Musharraf for two main reasons: he has failed to stop inflation, and “he has taken American money to kill his own people”.

The tragedy of Mr Musharraf is thus that his administration has been des­troyed by factors largely beyond his control – notably the relationship with the US – although some of his decisions may have made them worse. The tragedy of Pakistan is that these factors now apply to all Pakistani governments.