After the
Blast: 10 Questions for Benazir Bhutto
By Ahmed Quraishi
Islamabad, Pakistan
Benazir Bhutto’s husband
Asif Zardari accuses our intelligence agencies
from his home in Dubai of orchestrating the attack
on his wife, while Mrs. Bhutto, sitting in Karachi
, pointedly refuses to blame the spooks even when
reporters mention her husband’s statement.
This contradiction is just one of several questions
that ordinary Pakistanis need to ask Ms Bhutto
after the nation’s worst political violence
in our modern history.
Far from the argument of her supporters that Ms
Bhutto’s return to Pakistan will help ease
political tensions, her first day on our soil
has confirmed fears she is very much part of political
friction. Her recent brand of politics has further
divided Pakistanis instead of uniting them.
In the interest of removing misunderstandings,
the following ten questions must be posed to the
leader of Pakistan Peoples Party:
1. Why didn’t you ask your supporters to
avoid a mass rally when even your own friends
in the Pakistani and foreign governments warned
you about information that terrorists were planning
an attack?
2. Why did you refuse Pakistani government’s
offer of providing you a helicopter to take you
to your destination and insisted on leading a
street procession, knowing that scores of innocent
supporters will bear the brunt of any attack?
3. Why did vanity have the best of you? Why wasn’t
saving lives more important to you than showing
the world that you’re still a populist leader?
4. Why did you remove the bulletproof glass on
your secured truck that was supposed to protect
everyone in case of an attack? At least three
senior party members sustained injuries because
of this oversight.
5. Why an important segment of the Pakistani public
opinion believes that you have returned to Pakistan
as an ‘American agent’?
6. Why didn’t you bring your husband and
at least two of your three children [one is studying
in Europe] along with you to Pakistan to underscore
your commitment to our nation and to silence your
critics who insist you came here alone to test
the waters?
7. Why did you break the national consensus and
announce you will allow foreign investigators
access to our national hero Dr. A. Q. Khan?
8. Why did you inform an American audience that
you will allow foreign forces to conduct military
operations on Pakistani soil?
9. Why do you refuse to treat us Pakistanis as
intelligent people who by now are fully aware
that you and your husband have been found involved
in scandalous corruption incidents? Why can’t
you come clean on your alleged wealth of $ 1.5
billion dollars?
10. How come you have joined India, Hamid Karzai,
and the usual bunch of Pakistan-bashers in targeting
and attempting to eliminate Pakistan ’s
intelligence agencies, which are an asset for
any nation and a bulwark against saboteurs and
criminals?
My one last observation is the distasteful way
in which Ms Bhutto cracked a joke with foreign
reporters at the end of the press conference she
held at her house on the Karachi carnage.
Over 600 people were killed and injured because
of her and she had the gall to stand there in
front of rolling cameras to laugh and chuckle
at what happened.
Somehow this and the questions above reinforce
the widespread skepticism across Pakistan about
the quality of leadership that Mrs. Bhutto and
the other power contenders will bring to the nation.
(Ahmed. Quraishi heads the Pakistan Project at
FurmaanRealpolitik, an independent think tank
based in Islamabad. He also hosts a foreign policy
show on state run PTV Network. He can be reached
at aq@ahmedquraishi.com)
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