Khadija Magardie
When it comes to political chutzpah, even the most cynical would concede: Benazir Bhutto oozes it. In South Africa this week to attend Women’s Day celebrations, she made no secret of her primary raison d’tre to lobby for international support for her return to Pakistan, where she was once prime minister.
Despite imprisonment, detention, self-imposed exile and the threat
of being arrested if she sets foot in Pakistan, Bhutto’s will-power shows no signs of abating.
The chairperson of the opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) faces a mountain of charges back home, ranging from cronyism to authorising extra-judicial executions of political opponents. But she is optimistic that the international community favours her cause a return to civilian rule in a country where military dictatorships have been a hallmark of its history.
Bhutto believes the South African government, not only as a member of the Commonwealth but also as the “epicentre of freedom”, should put pressure on the military government of General Pervez Musharraf who seized power in a coup in 1999 to step down and return the country to civilian rule.
“South Africa has a special commitment to all those fighting for justice in their countries,” says Bhutto.
She acknowledges that the future of participatory politics in Pakistan is “uncertain”. But her crusade is not. “I plan to return to Pakistan every 30 days, but the regime always introduces something new to thwart my plans.”
Bhutto has been living in self-imposed exile in the United Arab Emirates for the past four years and travels the world to win support for her party’s cause.
Exile has come at a huge emotional cost to Bhutto. Her husband, Ali Ashraf Zardari, languishes in a Pakistani jail where, supporters allege, he has been tortured.
Zardari nicknamed “Mr 10%” by his critics has long been Bhutto’s Achilles heel. During her rule he was appointed to the Cabinet post of investment minister. One of the charges of which he stands accused is that he accepted bribes and pocketed money 10% from government contracts.
But exile has also opened a door to the outside world. When and if it happens, Bhutto’s return to power in Pakistan will likely be through an “information revolution”. She is lobbying to put pressure on Musharraf to level the political playing fields allowing her to return to contest an election, if one is called.
Though by the last day of her visit she had not managed to meet President Thabo Mbeki, she said she has informally met some “key” political figures in South Africa to discuss the future of opposition politics in Pakistan.
The Harvard and Oxford-educated Bhutto’s tempestuous political career, spanning close to a quarter of a century, has endeared her to the international community not least of all because in 1988 she became the first woman to be elected as prime minister of an Islamic country.
From her first forays into politics following the execution of her father in 1979 by the military government of General Zia Ul-Haq to her role as an opposition leader in exile in the new millennium, she has repeatedly championed the cause of civil liberties and political pluralism. Her image as a democrat has helped in 1996 the Guiness Book of Records listed her as “The world’s most popular politician”.
Her initial lack of political experience following her father’s death did not stop Bhutto leading the PPP to victory in the 1988 and 1993 parliamentary elections.
She says the military has economically devastated Pakistan the country is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Under the PPP, she says, several socialist policies were introduced, such as minimum wages and spending on social welfare and healthcare infrastructure. All the PPP’s hard-won gains, she says, have been destroyed by the present regime.
“This has come at a great cost to our national integrity, and for us to move forward, it’s essential that the generals give up power, nothing less,” she says.
She makes particular mention of the position of women in Pakistan, which has regressed since the PPP was out of power. Her government pumped resources into initiatives to highlight women abuse and was also signatory to various laws outlawing discrimination against women, including the United Nations Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.
“The biggest oppressor of women in Pakistan is present state negligence,” said Bhutto. This has not been helped by the increasing influence of the extremist Taliban from neighbouring Afghanistan. The Taliban postulate a regressive, archaic interpretation of Islam, particularly regarding the status of women.
Praising the gains South African women have made in various fields, including in politics and as law-makers, Bhutto says she owed a great deal, including her own political career, to the advances of the women’s movement.
But as several biographers and interviewers have noted, Bhutto, though as shrewd a politician as the next, retains an interesting distance when it comes to discussing what “she has done”.
“I’ve fought for, and will continue to fight for my people my personal suffering is separate.”