Benazir Bhutto - SZABIST

to a good old friend of the Bhutto family, the late President Hafez al Assad. I was representing Chief
Executive General Pervez Musharraf at the state funeral.
We maintained a cordial, formal and sometimes warm relationship. In the past seven years, on random
occasions, through common friends, we exchanged brief messages of goodwill. But now I regret I did
not make an attempt to seek a meeting since our last chance encounter.
In the 15 years during which we did meet, particularly in the 1988-1990 phase in which I served in her
first cabinet as minister of state for information and broadcasting and later, for science and
technology, I often became conscious of her vulnerability and her fragility, qualities that one does not
normally associate with a person of exceptional verve, composure and determination.
Behind her public persona of a bold defiance of dictators, of her bland, imperturbable expression that
would deflect and reject queries from interviewers about corruption charges, there existed a sensitive
private person thrust into public life through cruel twists and turns without a single day’s direct
experience of parliamentary membership or of executive responsibility.
To be the daughter of a famous leader long accustomed to public office is one thing. To become prime
minister in her own right, in a sense overnight, at a critical period without any prior personal exposure
to public office caused severe stress and strain on her, is another. On rare occasions, these became
visible. This made her all the more endearing.
My working relationship with Benazir Bhutto was sometimes tense and troubled, marked by strong
disagreements on some policy issues. Yet there was also amiability, affinity and humour. Whatever
the mood or situation, it was always memorable. In spite of our divergent perceptions on certain
issues, she sometimes entrusted me with extremely important tasks, a confidence on her part which I
greatly respected.
She was a leader of global calibre, and not just a daughter of the east. She inherited a powerful
political legacy and sustained it in many ways while also enhancing it in some respects and
diminishing it in others. In the new era of globalisation in the last two decades of the 20th century, in
the face of dramatic geopolitical changes that swept the world, in the context of the traumatic turmoil
that has marked Pakistan’s history in the first seven years of the 21st century, she remained, at home
and in self-exile, a unique and formidable leader.
Assassinated by a cabal of cowards and conspirators who should be urgently traced and punished, her
tragic loss opens up new challenges for society and the state of Pakistan. Every citizen who felt the
grief and the pain at her demise now has a duty to render an active role to curb mayhem and disorder,
to unite all progressive forces and to achieve the ideals she fought for.
More than ever before, there is a need to secure and strengthen the Federation of Pakistan for which
she sacrificed her life.
The writer is a former Senator and Federal Minister
DAWN
December 29, 2007