Islamabad, May 24 (Inditop) Eighteen months after retiring as the Pakistani Army chief, former president Pervez Musharraf has finally vacated Army House in the adjacent garrison town of Rawalpindi that he had continued to occupy on grounds of security.
Citing sources, Dawn said Sunday that Musharraf’s belongings had been moved to his sprawling country villa in the Chak Shahzad suburb of Islamabad.
Musharraf is currently on an extended lecture tour abroad and it is not clear when he would return, given the precarious security scenario in the country.
“The sources said very few belongings of the former army chief had been moved to Chak Shahzad. They said it was not clear whether or not Musharraf intended to settle down in Chak Shahzad,” the newspaper added.
When contacted, Maj. Gen. (retd) Rashid Qureshi, who has twice served as Musharraf’s spokesman, said he was unaware of the former president shifting out of Army House but that he had no plans to settle abroad.
“He has no plans to settle abroad,” Qureshi said, adding Musharraf would soon return home.
The Pakistani government is believed to have quietly suggested to Musharraf, who twice survived assassination attempts while he was army chief, to stay abroad at least till the present anti-Taliban operations by the security forces in the country’s restive northwest conclude.
Musharraf is known to be on the hit list of the Taliban and various other extremist groups.
Musharraf had retired as army chief in November 2007 and stepped down as president in September 2008. Though he continued to live in Army House, the present army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, had ordered the removal of all the highly sophisticated communications equipment from the facility.
It was not immediately clear when Kayani would move into Army House.