The military, seen as the backbone of the country, has been under pressure in recent months as a tribal insurgency rages in the frontier districts.

The unrest, fuelled in part by anger over Islamabad's support for the US-led war on terror, has increasingly spilt into the interior of the country.

Attacks on military personnel, troops surrendering to tribal warlords and reports of rising desertions from the ranks have dented the image of a force that Pakistanis refer to simply as the Establishment.

Despite the army's problems, however, General Musharraf, as the man in charge, appears to have little challenge to his military authority for now.

But his popularity with the civilian population is another matter, having dipped to its lowest since he took charge of the country following a coup in 1999.

Partly to assuage the popular mood, he had promised to give up his military uniform, if re-elected for a second five-year term as President, before reaching for emergency powers at the weekend when it appeared that the Supreme Court may thwart his plans.

His intelligence agencies apparently intercepted a conversation in which the Chief Justice appeared to gloat that eight of 11 judges hearing an election petition against Gen Musharraf seemed ready to rule that his re-election was illegal.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry has been Gen Musharraf's principal nemesis this year, with the President's March 9 attempt to sideline him boomeranging after unprecedented displays of public support for the head of the judiciary.

Since then, the Chief Justice has taken judicial activism to unparalleled - and to some, intolerable - heights. Earlier this year, for instance, he instructed the government to hand Islamabad's Red Mosque, scene of July's bloody stand-off between jihadis and the military, back to its pro-Taleban cleric.

Once the emergency was declared, one of Gen Musharraf's first acts was to fire the nettlesome Chief Justice and other judges who stood in his way. The authorities have also detained hundreds of prisoners and dissidents and curtailed media freedoms.

Under emergency laws, people criticising the military risk spending three years in jail, while Gen Musharraf is allowed to delay elections, due in three months, by up to a year.

However, the betting is that Gen Musharraf will not wait that long.

For one thing, international opinion has been firmly against the emergency.

Singapore, for one, has called the move 'very troubling', while even Gen Musharraf's biggest bulwark, United States President George W. Bush, has been openly critical.

US diplomats have also been busy over the last two days trying to persuade Gen Musharraf to stick to a power- sharing arrangement with Ms Benazir Bhutto, the country's most popular politician.

And political observer Najam Sethi says Gen Musharraf needs to move because his appeal is fading fast.

If he does not agree to hold elections quickly and share power, Ms Bhutto may pull out of their power-sharing accord, leaving his administration more isolated than ever.

With the upsurge in anti-Americanism, religious radicalism and civil strife that would follow, the prospects of Pakistan solely under Gen Musharraf would become questionable, according to Mr Sethi.

Gen Musharraf may have let himself believe he is the one force able to face down the chaos enveloping the country, but even he cannot miss the writing on the wall.

As the Dawn newspaper put it in an editorial this week: 'Only a government deriving a popular mandate can pull Pakistan out of the bog and maintain its unity and integrity.'

velloor@sph.com.sg