One compares himself to Mahatma Gandhi, the other - to Abraham Lincoln.

But, if you compare one to the other - Putin to Musharraf-Busharraf, that is - the Russian president seems like a baby.

So far, at least.

[...] Just after midnight, General Musharraf appeared on state-run television. In a 45-minute speech, he said he had declared the emergency to limit terrorist attacks and “preserve the democratic transition that I initiated eight years back.”

He gave no firm date for nationwide elections that had been scheduled for January and said his current Parliament, which he dominates, would remain in place. He did not say how long the state of emergency would be maintained.

The general, dressed in civilian clothes, quoted Lincoln, citing the former president’s suspension of some rights during the American Civil War as justification for his own state of emergency. [...]

The New York Times