Bruce Loudon, South Asia Correspondent | September 01, 2008
BENAZIR Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, has purged many of his assassinated wife's top advisers from the ruling Pakistan People's Party as he ramps up his bid to become Pakistan's president this week.
Latest polling shows that despite the endless series of allegations against him, Mr Zardari could win as many as 60 per cent of the votes cast when the country's electoral college meets on Saturday to elect a president.
The strong polling figures came despite a fierce denunciation of Mr Zardari as "corrupt and utterly illiterate" by the elder statesman of the Bhutto dynasty, Mumtaz Ali Bhutto.
"It's unfortunate for the country and ... for the party that a man of his background should become ... president," Mr Bhutto said.
"He is totally corrupt and utterly illiterate ... if he becomes the next president, what will be left of this country?"
At the same time, Benazir Bhutto's closest aide and confidante for more than 20 years, Naheed Khan, said party workers were "disillusioned and don't know what to do" about the rise of Mr Zardari.
Ms Khan, the wife of PPP senator Safdar Abbasi, was sitting next to Benazir Bhutto the day she was assassinated in Rawalpindi, on December 27 last year. On the other side of the PPP leader was her deputy, Makhdoom Amin Fahim.
Both Ms Khan and Mr Fahim have been purged by the PPP under Mr Zardari.
Mr Khan, a formidable woman who survived the attempt to kill Bhutto in Karachi when she returned home from exile in October last year, was for years the PPP leader's closest confidante, sometimes to the chagrin of her husband, who is said to have resented the influence she exerted.
Now she, along with many others who were close to Bhutto, have been sidelined by the new leadership under Mr Zardari.
Ms Khan was quoted yesterday as saying: "We were with Bibi (Benazir) through all the trials and tribulations and we loved our work with her. Party workers are disillusioned and don't know what to do. They have no access to him or people who work with him."
Another Bhutto adviser, Nawab Yusuf Talpur, told London's Sunday Times that only four or five members of Bhutto's team had made the transition to the Zardari camp.
"Most of the people trusted by Bibi are not trusted by him. Benazir had a vision and had the capacity to hold this party together. Her legacy is not being handled in the way we expected," he said.
Party stalwarts are outraged that Mr Zardari's aides have blamed Ms Khan for Bhutto's death. They have accused her of failing to protect Bhutto from the assassins who killed her in a sniper and suicide bomb attack.
Mr Zardari spent 11 years in jailon corruption and other charges and is widely blamed for Bhutto's two governments being dismissed, in 1990 and 1996.
Mr Zardari at the weekend snubbed calls to step aside from the presidential race. He also disclosed that his sister, Faryal Talpur, had withdrawn her nomination as his "covering" candidate in Saturday's election.
Pakistan's election system means that those who run for public office nominate "covering" candidates as possible substitutes in case they decide to withdraw at the last minute.
There had been speculation that Mr Zardari might withdraw in favour of Ms Talpur.
At the weekend, worried security officials, fearing a possible assassination attempt against Mr Zardari, rushed him from his Islamabad home to the heavily guarded compound of the prime minister's residence in the capital.
Pakistan's security forces have launched a major offensive against al-Qa'ida and Taliban-linked militants in the country's tribal areas, and there are fears of a retaliatory campaign of stepped-up suicide bombings and assassination attempts in the country's urban centres, with Mr Zardari a primary target.
Security authorities yesterday said they were tracking the movements of a team of suicide bombers believed to have left South Waziristan to attack targets in the Islamabad and Rawalpindi area.
Pakistan's top security official, Rehman Malik, announced yesterday that the all-out offensive would be suspended for the month of Ramadan, starting today. But he warned there would be no ceasefire and that if the militants "fired even one bullet, we will fire 10 in response".
In another sign of the country's new, "get tough" strategy towards the militants, Dr Malik disclosed for the first time that whenever suicide bombers were identified, their homes and villages would be destroyed - a tactic imported from Israel.
Reports yesterday said the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and the top US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, had returned home "well pleased and very satisfied" from last week's secret, shipboard meeting in the Indian Ocean with Pakistan's army boss, General Afshaq Kayani.
"I came away from the meeting very encouraged that the focus is where it needs to be and that the military-to-military relationship we're building with Pakistan is getting stronger every day," Admiral Mullen said.
BENAZIR Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, has purged many of his assassinated wife's top advisers from the ruling Pakistan People's Party as he ramps up his bid to become Pakistan's president this week.
Latest polling shows that despite the endless series of allegations against him, Mr Zardari could win as many as 60 per cent of the votes cast when the country's electoral college meets on Saturday to elect a president.
The strong polling figures came despite a fierce denunciation of Mr Zardari as "corrupt and utterly illiterate" by the elder statesman of the Bhutto dynasty, Mumtaz Ali Bhutto.
"It's unfortunate for the country and ... for the party that a man of his background should become ... president," Mr Bhutto said.
"He is totally corrupt and utterly illiterate ... if he becomes the next president, what will be left of this country?"
At the same time, Benazir Bhutto's closest aide and confidante for more than 20 years, Naheed Khan, said party workers were "disillusioned and don't know what to do" about the rise of Mr Zardari.
Ms Khan, the wife of PPP senator Safdar Abbasi, was sitting next to Benazir Bhutto the day she was assassinated in Rawalpindi, on December 27 last year. On the other side of the PPP leader was her deputy, Makhdoom Amin Fahim.
Both Ms Khan and Mr Fahim have been purged by the PPP under Mr Zardari.
Mr Khan, a formidable woman who survived the attempt to kill Bhutto in Karachi when she returned home from exile in October last year, was for years the PPP leader's closest confidante, sometimes to the chagrin of her husband, who is said to have resented the influence she exerted.
Now she, along with many others who were close to Bhutto, have been sidelined by the new leadership under Mr Zardari.
Ms Khan was quoted yesterday as saying: "We were with Bibi (Benazir) through all the trials and tribulations and we loved our work with her. Party workers are disillusioned and don't know what to do. They have no access to him or people who work with him."
Another Bhutto adviser, Nawab Yusuf Talpur, told London's Sunday Times that only four or five members of Bhutto's team had made the transition to the Zardari camp.
"Most of the people trusted by Bibi are not trusted by him. Benazir had a vision and had the capacity to hold this party together. Her legacy is not being handled in the way we expected," he said.
Party stalwarts are outraged that Mr Zardari's aides have blamed Ms Khan for Bhutto's death. They have accused her of failing to protect Bhutto from the assassins who killed her in a sniper and suicide bomb attack.
Mr Zardari spent 11 years in jailon corruption and other charges and is widely blamed for Bhutto's two governments being dismissed, in 1990 and 1996.
Mr Zardari at the weekend snubbed calls to step aside from the presidential race. He also disclosed that his sister, Faryal Talpur, had withdrawn her nomination as his "covering" candidate in Saturday's election.
Pakistan's election system means that those who run for public office nominate "covering" candidates as possible substitutes in case they decide to withdraw at the last minute.
There had been speculation that Mr Zardari might withdraw in favour of Ms Talpur.
At the weekend, worried security officials, fearing a possible assassination attempt against Mr Zardari, rushed him from his Islamabad home to the heavily guarded compound of the prime minister's residence in the capital.
Pakistan's security forces have launched a major offensive against al-Qa'ida and Taliban-linked militants in the country's tribal areas, and there are fears of a retaliatory campaign of stepped-up suicide bombings and assassination attempts in the country's urban centres, with Mr Zardari a primary target.
Security authorities yesterday said they were tracking the movements of a team of suicide bombers believed to have left South Waziristan to attack targets in the Islamabad and Rawalpindi area.
Pakistan's top security official, Rehman Malik, announced yesterday that the all-out offensive would be suspended for the month of Ramadan, starting today. But he warned there would be no ceasefire and that if the militants "fired even one bullet, we will fire 10 in response".
In another sign of the country's new, "get tough" strategy towards the militants, Dr Malik disclosed for the first time that whenever suicide bombers were identified, their homes and villages would be destroyed - a tactic imported from Israel.
Reports yesterday said the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and the top US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, had returned home "well pleased and very satisfied" from last week's secret, shipboard meeting in the Indian Ocean with Pakistan's army boss, General Afshaq Kayani.
"I came away from the meeting very encouraged that the focus is where it needs to be and that the military-to-military relationship we're building with Pakistan is getting stronger every day," Admiral Mullen said.
Source: The Australian
 |
Posts
