Pakistan Views

The peasants who gather round a life-size poster of Benazir Bhutto believe it will help resolve a tribal dispute and her party hopes such faith will translate into millions of votes. The martyred Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chairperson has become akin to a saint among people in her ancestral town of Larkana, ascribed with powers that most other candidates in next week’s elections can only dream of Larkana community leader Akhtar Mahoto said people not only bring verses by saints from the mystical Sufi strain of Islam to resolve local wrangles, now “the portrait of Benazir is also added because she commands such respect.” “At a recent meeting the participants agreed to settle a long-standing dispute with a pledge, before Benazir’s image, that they would not fight again,” Mahoto told AFP. “We consider these personalities as witness to our pledge and then swear on the Holy Quran to remain committed to our pledge,” he said. Benazir did not always have the same unifying power in life, as her martyrdom at a political rally in Rawalpindi on December 27 showed. But the two-term former prime minister nevertheless remained one of the only truly national leaders in a country riven by deep ethnic, religious, sectarian and political faultlines. Her Pakistan People’s Party is now counting on her to unite the country’s electorate against President Pervez Musharraf and also overcome some internal strife. Famously superstitious in life, Benazir’s new status in death chimes well with the folksy beliefs of the dustbowl farmers and warring clans in rural southern Sindh province, where she spent large parts of her childhood. It is also where she was buried after her martyrdom and her grave in the Bhutto family mausoleum in Ghari Khuda Bakhsh, has become a virtual shrine. During recent ceremonies to mark the 40th and final day of mourning for Benazir, women brought newborn babies to the five-domed tomb for her blessing. “This family of martyrs has always helped us. We believe their blessings for my grandson will make him successful,” said Shahida Bibi, 50, carrying her two-week-old grandson. Martyrs are certainly part of the growing Bhutto mythology. Benazir is buried alongside her father, ex-prime minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was hanged in 1979, while her two brothers lie nearby. “I have watched people visit Shaheed Baba’s (Zulfiqar Bhutto’s) grave for years but after Benazir’s martyrdom this trend has become stronger,” said Karim Bakhsh Bhutto, an unrelated resident living near the tomb. “Benazir was a hope for us when she was alive and many of her followers have not yet lost that hope,” he said. Nor has her Pakistan People’s Party. “The sympathy element is very strong,” PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar told

Assassinated opposition leader Benazir is to be posthumously awarded Ireland’s 2007 Tipperary Peace Prize, the organisers said on Tuesday. Benazir was recognised for her “courageous” work for democracy and reconciliation, said the Tipperary Peace Convention, which has in the past honoured South Africa’s Nelson Mandela and Live Aid organiser Bob Geldof.

“Ms Benazir fought all her battles through dialogue and political debate and was an example to all those who do not use or surrender to terrorism,” it said in a statement. “Her selection as Peace Prize recipient should act as an inspiration to those in Pakistan who seek to secure democracy and reconciliation for their country,” it added.

The Convention said the accolade was to “recognise the very difficult path towards peace and democracy in Pakistan and the ultimate sacrifice made by Ms Bhutto in her campaign to put her country back on the road to democracy”.

“Ms Benazir, a former two-time Prime Minister, was an incredibly brave and courageous woman who had returned from exile to her homeland to lead her party in the forthcoming elections. “She knew the risks involved in her return but she did so because she felt that her country and the Pakistani people needed her.”

Twelve important members of the US Congress have warned that if the White House does not stand for getting the investigation from the United Nations into the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and holding the elections on the scheduled date of January 8 then the restrictions imposed on the US aid for Pakistan may be increased.

According to senior journalist Shaheen Sehbai, the new year vacations are going on in the American Congress but despite this, the twelve important members of the majority Democratic Party have written a letter to US foreign minister Condoleezza Rice.

Grave concern was expressed on the Bush administration policy regarding the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the expected delay in holding the elections and this was condemned in the letter.

This has been said in the letter that they were concerned over the White House statement that the assassination of Benazir Bhutto was Pakistan’s internal matter. However, the US has always supported the international demands for investigating such events of independent countries on world level and the example of the probe into the murder of former president of Lebanon Rafiq Hariri is before in this connection.

This has also been said in the letter that the conflicting reports are coming regarding the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and a few serious questions are arising such as conflicting statement of doctor and issue of video tape.

This situation demands for a world level probe into the murder of Benazir Bhutto.

Besides, it was said by the White House that if the elections are postponed then the new date should be declared and this statement is not right as it is practically an open invitation for delaying the polls.

This was said in the letter that the US has already stopped $50 million from this year’s US aid to Pakistan and if, in this situation, fair and independent investigations in the murder of Benazir are not held and the elections are delayed then an eye would be kept on the US funds already stopped for Pakistan and attention would be given towards imposing additional sanctions in future.

The letter has asked the White House and the Bush administration to stress on holding the elections in Pakistan.

Despite mounting disbelief, government stuck to its position on Tuesday that Benazir Bhutto was killed when she cracked her skull on the lever on a sunroof of her car during a gun and bomb attack.

The opposition leader’s Pakistans Peoples Party says she was shot, and most Pakistanis agree.

Video footage surfaced on Monday showing a clean-cut young man firing a pistol at Bhutto from a distance of about 10 feet (3 metres), her white shawl appearing to move, perhaps as a bullet struck, and her dropping back into the armoured vehicle.

The raging controversy about exactly how she was killed as she left an election rally in Rawalpindi last Thursday has virtually eclipsed the question of who was behind the attack.

Just over 24 hours after Bhutto’s death the Interior Ministry said three shots had been fired moments before a suicide bomber struck but neither bullets nor blast fragments had killed her.

The ministry’s spokesman said that Bhutto had been killed when she ducked, the explosion forced her head against a lever jutting from the sunroof, and the blow fractured her skull.

Ministers of the caretaker government met senior editors on Monday and apologised for the “crude” way the Interior Ministry spokesman had announced the government conclusion.

But caretaker Interior Minister Hamid Nawaz said the government was not changing its stance.

“His remarks were a little crude (but) there is no change in the factual position,” that Bhutto’s head struck the lever, Nawaz told Reuters.

“That is what the present facts are indicating but maybe tomorrow something new will come up once the investigation people get additional facts,” he said.

Asked about the video footage showing the man shooting at Bhutto, he said: “The investigation would consider this also.”

NO AUTOPSY

While the bomb blast moments later killed more than 20 people, none of Bhutto’s companions inside her vehicle was hurt.

The controversy about how she actually died has only fuelled conspiracy theories in a country where many people see the hand of feared security agencies or powerful foreign countries behind virtually every political crisis.

The government has blamed an al Qaeda-linked militant based on the Afghan border, Baitullah Mehsud, for the attack but many Pakistanis believe Bhutto’s old enemies, perhaps from within the powerful security agencies, were involved.

Former intelligence chief Asad Durrani said the government’s rush to explain Bhutto’s death was “completely unnecessary” and would not end accusations of a security failure.

“In their eagerness to find something to justify themselves they sometimes concoct things that come back to haunt them.”

Doctors who examined Bhutto said no bullet or shrapnel showed up on an X-ray. The single wound on her head did not look like a bullet wound but appeared to indicate a forceful blow by some heavy object, one said.

Doctors released an inconclusive report saying the cause of death was “an open head injury with depressed skull fracture, leading to cardiopulmonary arrest”.

A senior hospital source said the doctors had been under intense pressure from all sides over the cause of death.

No autopsy had been performed, at the request of her family, the government said.

Bhutto’s husband, Asif Ali Zardari, confirmed that, saying an autopsy had not been necessary when the cause of death was so obviously a bullet. He also expressed scepticism about how an autopsy would have been done.

“I have lived here long enough to know how and where an autopsy would have been conducted,” he told reporters.

PPP has called for a UN investigation into her assassination but the government has said Pakistani investigators were capable of conducting the inquiry. A four-member Pakistani police team and a separate judicial team are investigating.

Martyred Benazir Bhutto’s party appointed her son Bilawal and her husband Asif Ali Zardari to succeed the slain PPP leader on Sunday and the party said it would take part in a Jan 8 election as Martyred Benazir would have wanted.

But a senior official of the former ruling party said the election was likely to be delayed for up to eight weeks.

Benazir martyrdom in a suicide attack on Thursday has stoked violence and thrown into doubt the election, deepening a crisis in the important US ally against terrorism as it struggles to emerge from military rule.

Bilawal, an Oxford law student, is Bhutto’s 19-year-old son. He will lead the party as chairman with his father, Asif Ali Zardari, who is to be co-chairman.

Zardari said the party would take part in the election as his martyred Benazir would have wanted.

“Despite this dangerous situation, we will go for January 8 elections, according to her will and thinking,” Zardari told a news conference at the martyred Benazir family home in Naudero, after a party meeting.

Bilawal, introduced at the news conference as Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, said the party’s long struggle for democracy would continue with new vigour. “My mother always said, democracy is the best revenge,” he said.

Earlier, a senior official of the party that backs President Pervez Musharraf and ruled until a caretaker government was set up last month, said a postponement of the election was increasingly likely because of the turmoil that erupted after Benazir martyrdom.

“It seems more than likely that elections will be delayed,” the official, Tariq Azim Khan, told Reuters. He said he expected a six to eight week postponement.

Martyred Benazir had hoped to win power for a third time in the vote though analysts expected a three-way split between her, PML-N and PML-Q.

The party can expect to pick up a sympathy vote after Benazir’s martyrdom and its core support would remain for now, even though Bilawal would return to university

“It will retain support in the short term but obviously, in the long term they’ll have to earn their spurs and demonstrate leadership,” said former minister and analyst Shafqat Mahmood.

But the choice of the Bilawal and Zardari to lead the party raised eyebrows among some people.

“I don’t think Zardari is capable enough of handling the party himself. Bilawal is too young, the father is not capable. Someone else should be appointed,” said Ferooz Menon, 37, who has an electronics business in the eastern city of Lahore.

Anger against Musharraf burns strongly among martyred Benazir Bhutto supporters and since her death sporadic violence has erupted, boosting fears about country stability.

The death toll from the violence has reached 47.

Streets in Karachi were generally quiet and deserted on Sunday though a disabled man was burned to death when a petrol station was set on fire.

Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party has dismissed a government statement that al Qaeda killed her, saying Musharraf’s embattled administration was trying to cover up its failure to protect her.

India has ended its high alert for forces along the Pakistan border and restored some transport links, officials said on Monday, following disruption in the wake of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination.

The killing of the Pakistani opposition leader in a suicide attack on Thursday unleashed a wave of violence in Pakistan. India had feared chaos could spill across the border and ordered a “high state of vigil” on Friday.

But with cities in Pakistan beginning to emerge from several days of unrest, India’s border is no longer on “red alert”, a home ministry official said.

The bi-weekly Delhi-Lahore Samjhauta Express train resumed services on Sunday, the railway ministry said. The Thar Express, a weekly service between India’s Rajasthan state and Pakistan’s Sindh province, will run again on Saturday “if the situation improves”, a ministry official said.

Relations between the neighbours, which have been to war three times and nearly fought another conflict in 2002, are always fraught despite a fragile peace process in the past few years.

Pakistan’s political leaders must strive for democracy, which would stand as a lasting memorial to assassinated opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Monday.

In an article for daily Urdu newspaper, Brown said it was important Bhutto’s killing did not deflect the country’s political leaders from the pursuit of democracy and that scheduled elections could be free, fair and secure.

“A strong representative democracy in Pakistan will defeat terrorism and extremism, show the path to a more stable, prosperous future, and stand as a lasting memorial to the life’s work of Benazir Bhutto,” Brown wrote.

“We owe it to her memory to strive together to achieve that goal,” he said.

Bhutto’s killing in a suicide attack on Thursday stoked bloodshed across the country, casting doubt on nuclear-armed Pakistan’s stability and its transition to civilian rule.

Electoral officials are due to hold an emergency meeting on Monday to decide whether to go ahead with a planned Jan. 8 election. Bhutto’s party, which chose her son and husband on Sunday to succeed her, has said it will take part in the election.

Thirty persons including Chairperson, Pakistan Peoples Party, Ms Benazir Bhutto were killed and several others injured in an attack here outside Liaquat Bagh, Rawaplpindi on Thursday.

According to rescue team more than 30 persons were dead in the suicide bomb attack occurred after the public meeting of PPP here at Liaquat Bagh.

Earlier, Asif Zardari, husband of Ms Benazir Bhutto informed that she had sustained serious injuries and was given medical treatment at a hospital.

Benazir Bhutto addressed a public meeting in Liaquat Bagh and soon after she went out, a suicide bomb blast occurred outside the venue.

At least 20 persons have been confirmed to have been killed in the incident, including policemen. Body parts of a number of people scattered around after the power blast.

Police have described the blast a suicide attack.

Leader of PPP, Farhatullah Babur said sound of a powerful blast was heard when the vehicle of Benazir Bhutto was moving past the gate of the bagh.

The rescue team said the blast took lives of more than 30 persons.

Initially, PPP leader Rehman Malik had said that Ms Bhutto remained safe.

Later, Asif Ali Zardari, husband of Benazir Bhutto informed that she had received severe injuries. The police sources also confirmed that Bhutto has sustained critical injuries and shifted to a hospital.

The latest reports said that Benazir Bhutto was killed by fire hitting her neck.

The death of PPP Chairperson agitated the party workers.

PML (N) Chief, Mian Nawaz Sharif, condemned strong words the attack on PPP public meeting. He said the PML (N) public meeting scheduled to be held in Rawalpindi had been cancelled in view of the tragic incident.

PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto vowed to fight for workers’ rights on Wednesday as she took her campaign for January general elections to an industrial belt near the capital.

Western allies hope the election will restore stability in a nuclear-armed country vital to the battle against militancy. The three-way race pits Benazir Bhutto, against the party of another former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, and a party that backs President Pervez Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 coup.

Many Pakistanis say they are disillusioned with all three leaders and their main concerns are high prices and unemployment.

Tapping into those worries, Benazir told a crowd of about 600 people in the town of Wah, 30 km (20 miles) northwest of Islamabad, she would help the poor.

“We believe that Pakistan can only be a strong state when labourers and poor people become strong and empowered,” she said.

“We assure you we will not leave labourers alone and we’ll not ignore them,” she said, promising to reinstate sacked workers and beef up labour laws.

Benazir was travelling up the Grand Trunk road that used to link Delhi with the Khyber Pass on the Afghan border, where Pakistani armaments, mechanical and textile factories are based.

Small groups of people beside the road waved PPP flags and threw rose petals at her convoy as she passed.

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairperson Benazir Bhutto said that people of Balochistan has forced to pick the arms and their deprivations would be compensated if she comes to power.

She made the promise while addressing a campaign rally in Dera Allahyar.

Ms Bhutto also said she would find all missing persons, and release political prisoners from the region.

The PPP chairperson made accusations against the ruling party claiming the Punjab Governor’s house will be the source of rigging in the upcoming elections.

But she appeared satisfied that President Musharraf has so far lived up to his promises on the ‘roadmap to democracy’ having lifted emergency rule and removing his uniform. She said that the promise of transparent elections is the only point that remains to be fulfilled.

Former Chief Minister of Balochistan and candidate of NA-266 Taj Jamali, Mir Sadiq Imrani, Qaim Ali Shah also addressed the rally.