Who was Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq?

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1. GiGi
   

   General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq (b. August 12, 1924–August 17, 1988) was the president and military ruler of Pakistan from July 1977 to his death in August 1988. Appointed Chief of Army Staff in 1976, General Zia-ul-Haq came to power after he overthrew ruling Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in a military coup d'état on July 5, 1977 and became the state's third ruler to impose martial law. The coup itself was largely bloodless; however, he later had Bhutto executed.
   
   Zia initially ruled for a year as Chief Martial Law Administrator (CMLA), and later assumed the post of President of Pakistan in September 1978. During his tenure, he advanced the Islamization and radicalization of Pakistan. To shore up the increasingly tenuous control of the central government over the tribal provinces, he appointed martial law administrators as governors of Balochistan and the tribal areas with wide powers, including the abridgement of civil liberties.
   
   Zia was killed along with several of his top generals and the then United States Ambassador to Pakistan Arnold Lewis Raphel in a mysterious aircraft crash near Bahawalpur (Punjab) on August 17, 1988, the circumstances of which remain unclear. His death with the American ambassador gave rise to many conspiracy theories.

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