Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was born on June 21, 1953, and
was assassinated on December 27, 2007. Benazir Bhutto was a Pakistani politician
who chaired the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), a centre-left political party in
Pakistan. Bhutto was the first woman elected to lead a Muslim state, having twice
been Prime Minister of Pakistan (1988–1990; 1993–1996).
Benazir Bhutto was the eldest child of former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto,
a Pakistani of Sindhi descent (Arain) and Shia Muslim by faith, and Begum Nusrat
Bhutto, a Pakistani of Iranian-Kurdish descent, similarly Shia Muslim by faith.
Her paternal grandfather was Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto, who came to Larkana District
in Sindh before the partition from his native town of Bhatto Kalan, which was
situated in the Indian state of Haryana.
Benazir Bhutto was sworn in for the first time in 1988 at the age of 35, but
was removed from office 20 months later under the order of then-president Ghulam
Ishaq Khan on grounds of alleged corruption. In 1993 Bhutto was re-elected but
was again removed in 1996 on similar charges, this time by President Farooq
Leghari. Benazir Bhutto went into self-imposed exile in Dubai in 1998.
Benazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan on October 18, 2007, after reaching an
understanding with President Pervez Musharraf by which she was granted amnesty
and all corruption charges were withdrawn. She was assassinated on December
27, 2007, after departing a PPP rally in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi, two
weeks before the scheduled Pakistani general election of 2008 where she was
a leading opposition candidate.
Benazir Bhutto was born to Begum Nusrat Ispahani, and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of
a prominent Shia Muslim family of Larkana, in Karachi, Dominion of Pakistan,
on June 21, 1953. She attended the Lady Jennings Nursery School and then the
Convent of Jesus and Mary in Karachi. After two years of schooling at the Rawalpindi
Presentation Convent, she was sent to the Jesus and Mary Convent at Murree.
She passed her O-level examinations at the age of 15. She then went on to complete
her A-Levels at the Karachi Grammar School.
After completing her early education in Pakistan, she pursued her higher education
in the United States. From 1969 to 1973 she attended Radcliffe College at Harvard
University, where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree with cum laude honors
in comparative government. She was also elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Benazir Bhutto
would later call her time at Harvard "four of the happiest years of my
life" and said it formed "the very basis of [her] belief in democracy".
As Prime Minister, she arranged a gift from the Pakistani government to Harvard
Law School.
The next phase of her education took place in the United Kingdom. Between 1973
and 1977 Benazir Bhutto studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Lady
Margaret Hall, Oxford, during which time she completed additional courses in
International Law and Diplomacy. After LMH she attend St Catherine's College,
Oxford and in December 1976 she was elected president of the Oxford Union, becoming
the first Asian woman to head the prestigious debating society.
On December 18, 1987, she married Asif Ali Zardari in Karachi. The couple had
three children: Bilawal, Bakhtwar and Aseefa.
Benazir Bhutto's father, former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was removed
from office following a military coup in 1977 led by the then military chief
General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who imposed martial law but promised to hold elections
within three months. But later, instead of fulfilling the promise of holding
general elections, General Zia charged Mr. Bhutto with conspiring to murder
the father of dissident politician Ahmed Raza Kasuri. Mr. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto
was sentenced to death by the martial law court.
Despite the accusation being "widely doubted by the public", and
despite many clemency appeals from foreign leaders, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was
hanged on April 4, 1979. Appeals for clemency were dismissed by acting President
General Zia. Benazir Bhutto and her mother were held in a "police camp"
until the end of May, after the execution.
In 1985, Benazir Bhutto's brother Shahnawaz was killed under suspicious circumstances
in France. The killing of another of her brothers, Mir Murtaza, in 1996, contributed
to destabilizing her second term as Prime Minister.
Benazir Bhutto, who had returned to Pakistan after completing her studies,
found herself placed under house arrest in the wake of her father's imprisonment
and subsequent execution. Having been allowed in 1984 to return to the United
Kingdom, she became a leader in exile of the PPP, her father's party, though
she was unable to make her political presence felt in Pakistan until after the
death of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. She had succeeded her mother as leader
of the PPP and the pro-democracy opposition to the Zia-ul-Haq regime.
On November 16, 1988, in the first open election in more than a decade, Benazir
Bhutto's PPP won the largest bloc of seats in the National Assembly. Bhutto
was sworn in as Prime Minister of a coalition government on December 2, becoming
at age 35 the youngest person—and the first woman—to head the government
of a Muslim-majority state in modern times. In 1989, she was awarded the Prize
For Freedom by the Liberal International. Benazir Bhutto's accomplishments during
this time were in initiatives for nationalist reform and modernization, that
some conservatives characterized as Westernization. Benazir Bhutto's government
was dismissed in 1990 following charges of corruption, for which she was never
tried. Zia's protégé Nawaz Sharif came to power after the October
1990 elections. She served as leader of the opposition while Sharif served as
Prime Minister for the next three years.
Elections were held again in October 1993 and her PPP coalition was victorious,
returning Benazir Bhutto to office. She continued with her reform initiatives.
In 1996, amidst various corruption scandals Bhutto was dismissed by then-president
Farooq Leghari, who used the Eighth Amendment discretionary powers to dissolve
the government. The Supreme Court affirmed President Leghari's dismissal in
a 6-1 ruling. Criticism against Benazir Bhutto came from the Punjabi elites
and powerful landlord families who opposed Bhutto. She blamed this opposition
for the destabilization of Pakistan. Irshad Manji judged her attempts to modernize
Pakistan a failure. Musharraf characterized Benazir Bhutto's terms as an "era
of sham democracy" and others characterized her terms a period of corrupt,
failed governments.
During the election campaigns the Benazir Bhutto government voiced its concern
for women's social and health issues, including the issue of discrimination against
women. Bhutto announced plans to establish women's police stations, courts, and
women's development banks. Despite these plans, Benazir Bhutto did not propose
any legislation to improve welfare services for women. During her election campaigns,
she promised to repeal controversial laws (such as Hudood and Zina ordinances)
that curtail the rights of women in Pakistan, but the party did not fulfill these
promises during her tenures as Prime Minister, due to immense pressure from the
opposition.
After Benazir Bhutto's stints as Prime Minister, during General Musharraf's
regime, her party did initiate legislation to repeal the Zina ordinance. These
efforts were defeated by the right-wing religious parties that dominated the
legislatures at the time.
Benazir Bhutto was an active and founding member of the Council of Women World
Leaders, a network of current and former prime ministers and presidents.
The Taliban took power in Kabul in September 1996. It was during Bhutto's rule
that the Taliban gained prominence in Afghanistan. She, like many leaders at the
time, viewed the Taliban as a group that could stabilize Afghanistan and enable
trade access to the Central Asian republics, according to author Stephen Coll.
He claims that like the United States, her government provided military and financial
support for the Taliban, even sending a small unit of the Pakistani army into
Afghanistan.
More recently, she took an anti-Taliban stance, and condemned terrorist acts
allegedly committed by the Taliban and their supporters.
French, Polish, Spanish, and Swiss documents have fueled the charges of corruption
against Benazir Bhutto and her husband. Bhutto and her husband faced a number
of legal proceedings, including a charge of laundering money through Swiss banks.
Though never convicted, her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, spent eight years in prison
on similar corruption charges. After being released on bail in 2004, Zardari suggested
that his time in prison involved torture; human rights groups have supported his
claim that his rights were violated.
A 1998 New York Times investigative report claims that Pakistani investigators
have documents that uncover a network of bank accounts, all linked to the family's
lawyer in Switzerland, with Asif Zardari as the principal shareholder. According
to the article, documents released by the French authorities indicated that
Zardari offered exclusive rights to Dassault, a French aircraft manufacturer,
to replace the air force's fighter jets in exchange for a 5% commission to be
paid to a Swiss corporation controlled by Zardari. The article also said a Dubai
company received an exclusive license to import gold into Pakistan for which
Asif Zardari received payments of more than $10 million into his Dubai-based
Citibank accounts. The owner of the company denied that he had made payments
to Zardari and claims the documents were forged.
Benazir Bhutto maintained that the charges levelled against her and her husband
were purely political. An Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) report supports
Bhutto's claim. It presents information suggesting that Benazir Bhutto was ousted
from power in 1990 as a result of a witch hunt approved by then-president Ghulam
Ishaq Khan. The AGP report says Khan illegally paid legal advisers 28 million
rupees to file 19 corruption cases against Benazir Bhutto and her husband in
1990-92.
Yet the assets held by Bhutto and her husband continue to be scrutinized and
speculated about. The prosecutors have alleged that their Swiss bank accounts
contain £740 million. Zardari also bought a neo-Tudor mansion and estate
worth over £4 million in Surrey, England, UK. The Pakistani investigations
have tied other overseas properties to Zardari's family. These include a $2.5
million manor in Normandy owned by Zardari's parents, who had modest assets
at the time of his marriage. Benazir Bhutto denied holding substantive overseas
assets.
On July 23, 1998, the Swiss Government handed over documents to the government
of Pakistan which relate to corruption allegations against Benazir Bhutto and
her husband. The documents included a formal charge of money laundering by Swiss
authorities against Zardari. The Pakistani government had been conducting a wide-ranging
inquiry to account for more than $13.7 million frozen by Swiss authorities in
1997 that was allegedly stashed in banks by Benazir Bhutto and her husband. The
Pakistani government recently filed criminal charges against Benazir Bhutto in
an effort to track down an estimated $1.5 billion she and her husband are alleged
to have received in a variety of criminal enterprises. The documents suggest that
the money Zardari was alleged to have laundered was accessible to Benazir Bhutto
and had been used to buy a diamond necklace for over $175,000. The PPP has responded
by flatly denying the charges, suggesting that Swiss authorities have been misled
by false evidence provided by the Government of Pakistan.
On August 6, 2003, Swiss magistrates found Benazir Bhutto and her husband guilty
of money laundering. They were given six-month suspended jail terms, fined $50,000
each and were ordered to pay $11 million to the Pakistani government. The six-year
trial concluded that Bhutto and Zardari deposited in Swiss accounts $10 million
given to them by a Swiss company in exchange for a contract in Pakistan. The
couple said they would appeal. The Pakistani investigators say Zardari opened
a Citibank account in Geneva in 1995 through which they say he passed some $40
million of the $100 million he received in payoffs from foreign companies doing
business in Pakistan. In October 2007, Daniel Zappelli, chief prosecutor of
the canton of Geneva, said he received the conclusions of a money laundering
investigation against former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on October
29, but it was unclear whether there would be any further legal action against
her in Switzerland.
The Polish Government has given Pakistan 500 pages of documentation relating
to corruption allegations against Benazir Bhutto and her husband. These charges
are in regard to the purchase of 8,000 tractors in a 1997 deal. According to
Pakistani officials, the Polish papers contain details of illegal commissions
paid by the tractor company in return for agreeing to their contract. It was
alleged that the arrangement "skimmed" Rs 103 mn rupees ($2 million)
in kickbacks. "The documentary evidence received from Poland confirms the
scheme of kickbacks laid out by Asif Zardari and Benazir Bhutto in the name
of (the) launching of Awami tractor scheme", APP said. Bhutto and Asif
Ali Zardari allegedly received a 7.15% commission on the purchase through their
front men, Jens Schlegelmilch and Didier Plantin of Dargal S.A., who received
about $1.969 million for supplying 5,900 Ursus tractors.
Potentially the most lucrative deal alleged in the documents involved the effort
by Dassault Aviation, a French military contractor. French authorities indicated
in 1998 that Benazir Bhutto's husband, Zardari, offered exclusive rights to
Dassault to replace the air force’s fighter jets in exchange for a five
percent commission to be paid to a corporation in Switzerland controlled by
Zardari.
At the time, French corruption laws forbade bribery of French officials but
permitted payoffs to foreign officials, and even made the payoffs tax-deductible
in France. However, France changed this law in 2000.
In the largest single payment investigators have uncovered, a gold bullion dealer
in Western Asia was alleged to have deposited at least $10 million into one of
Zardari's accounts after the Bhutto government gave him a monopoly on gold imports
that sustained Pakistan's jewelery industry. The money was allegedly deposited
into Zardari's Citibank account in Dubai. Pakistan's Arabian Sea coast, stretching
from Karachi to the border with Iran, has long been a gold smugglers' haven. Until
the beginning of Bhutto's second term, the trade, running into hundreds of millions
of dollars a year, was unregulated, with slivers of gold called biscuits, and
larger weights in bullion, carried on planes and boats that travel between the
Persian Gulf and the largely unguarded Pakistani coast.
Shortly after Bhutto returned as prime minister in 1993, a Pakistani bullion
trader in Dubai, Abdul Razzak Yaqub, proposed a deal: in return for the exclusive
right to import gold, Razzak would help the government regularize the trade.
In November 1994, Pakistan's Commerce Ministry wrote to Razzak informing him
that he had been granted a license that made him, for at least the next two
years, Pakistan's sole authorized gold importer. In an interview in his office
in Dubai, Razzak acknowledged that he had used the license to import more than
$500 million in gold into Pakistan, and that he had travelled to Islamabad several
times to meet with Bhutto and Zardari. But he denied that there had been any
corruption or secret deals. "I have not paid a single cent to Zardari,"
he said. Razzak claims that someone in Pakistan who wished to destroy his reputation
had contrived to have his company wrongly identified as the depositor. "Somebody
in the bank has cooperated with my enemies to make false documents," he
said.
Bhutto's niece and others have publicly accused Bhutto of complicity in the
killing of her brother Murtaza Bhutto in 1996 by uniformed police officers while
she was Prime Minister.
In 2002, Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf amended Pakistan's constitution
to ban prime ministers from serving more than two terms. This disqualified Bhutto
from ever holding the office again. This move was widely considered to be a direct
attack on former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif. On August 3,
2003, Bhutto became a member of Minhaj ul Quran International (an international
Muslim educational and welfare organization).
While living in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, she cared for her three children
and her mother, who was suffering from Alzheimer's disease, traveling to give
lectures and keeping in touch with the PPP's supporters. They were reunited
with her husband in December 2004 after more than five years. In 2006, Interpol
issued a request for the arrest of Bhutto and her husband on corruption charges,
at the request of Pakistan. The Bhuttos questioned the legality of the requests
in a letter to Interpol. On January 27, 2007, she was invited by the United
States to speak to President George W. Bush and Congressional and State Department
officials. Bhutto appeared as a panellist on the BBC TV programme Question Time
in the UK in March 2007. She has also appeared on BBC current affairs programme
Newsnight on several occasions. She rebuffed comments made by Muhammad Ijaz-ul-Haq
in May 2007 regarding the knighthood of Salman Rushdie, citing that he was calling
for the assassination of foreign citizens.
Bhutto had declared her intention to return to Pakistan within 2007, which
she did, in spite of Musharraf's statements of May 2007 about not allowing her
to return ahead of the country's general election, due late 2007 or early 2008.
It was speculated that she may have been offered the office of Prime Minister
again.
Arthur Herman, a U.S. historian, in a controversial letter published in The
Wall Street Journal on June 14, 2007, in response to an article by Bhutto highly
critical of the president and his policies, described her as "One of the
most incompetent leaders in the history of South Asia", and asserted that
she and other elites in Pakistan hate Musharraf because he was a muhajir, the
son of one of millions of Indian Muslims who fled to Pakistan during partition
in 1947. Herman claimed, "Although it was muhajirs who agitated for the
creation of Pakistan in the first place, many native Pakistanis view them with
contempt and treat them as third-class citizens."
Nonetheless, by mid-2007, the US appeared to be pushing for a deal in which
Musharraf would remain as president but step down as military head, and either
Bhutto or one of her nominees would become prime minister.
On July 11, 2007, the Associated Press, in an article about the possible aftermath
of the Red Mosque incident, wrote:
Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister and opposition leader expected
by many to return from exile and join Musharraf in a power-sharing deal after
year-end general elections, praised him for taking a tough line on the Red
Mosque. I'm glad there was no cease-fire with the militants in the mosque
because cease-fires simply embolden the militants," she told Britain's
Sky TV on Tuesday. "There will be a backlash, but at some time we have
to stop appeasing the militants."
This remark about the Red Mosque was seen with dismay in Pakistan as reportedly
hundreds of young students were burned to death and remains are untraceable
and cases are being heard in Pakistani supreme court as a missing persons issue.
This and subsequent support for Musharaf led Elder Bhutto's comrades like Khar
to criticize her publicly.
Bhutto however advised Musharraf in an early phase of the latter's quarrel
with the Chief Justice, to restore him. Her PPP did not capitalize on its CEC
member, Aitzaz Ahsan, the chief Barrister for the Chief Justice, in successful
restoration. Rather he was seen as a rival and was isolated.
The Bhutto-led PPP secured the highest number of votes (28.42%) and eighty
seats (23.16%) in the national assembly in the October 2002 general elections.
Pakistan Muslim League (N) (PML-N) managed to win eighteen seats only. Some
of the elected candidates of PPP formed a faction of their own, calling it PPP-Patriots
which was being led by Makhdoom Faisal Saleh Hayat, the former leader of Bhutto-led
PPP. They later formed a coalition government with Musharraf's party, PML-Q.
In mid-2002 Musharraf implemented a two-term limit on Prime Ministers. Both
Bhutto and Musharraf's other chief rival, Nawaz Sharif, have already served
two terms as Prime Minister. Musharraf's allies in parliament, especially the
PMLQ, are unlikely to reverse the changes to allow Prime Ministers to seek third
terms, nor to make particular exceptions for either Bhutto or Sharif.
In July 2007, some of Bhutto's frozen funds were released. Bhutto continued
to face significant charges of corruption. In an 8 August 2007 interview with
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Bhutto revealed the meeting focused on
her desire to return to Pakistan for the 2008 elections, and of Musharraf retaining
the Presidency with Bhutto as Prime Minister. On August 29, 2007, Bhutto announced
that Musharraf would step down as chief of the army. On 1 September Bhutto vowed
to return to Pakistan "very soon", regardless of whether or not she
reached a power-sharing deal with Musharraf before then.
On September 17, 2007, Bhutto accused Musharraf's allies of pushing Pakistan
into crisis by their refusal to permit democratic reforms and power-sharing.
A nine-member panel of Supreme Court judges deliberated on six petitions (including
one from Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan's largest Islamic group) asserting that Musharraf
be disqualified from contending for the presidency of Pakistan. Bhutto stated
that her party could join one of the opposition groups, potentially that of
Nawaz Sharif. Attorney-general Malik Mohammed Qayyum stated that, pendente lite,
the Election Commission was "reluctant" to announce the schedule for
the presidential vote. Bhutto's party's Farhatullah Babar stated that the Constitution
of Pakistan could bar Musharraf from being elected again because he was already
chief of the army: "As Gen. Musharraf was disqualified from contesting
for President, he has prevailed upon the Election Commission to arbitrarily
and illegally tamper with the Constitution of Pakistan."
Musharraf prepared to switch to a strictly civilian role by resigning from
his position as commander-in-chief of the armed forces. He still faced other
legal obstacles to running for re-election. On October 2, 2007, Gen. Musharraf
named Lt. Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, as vice chief of the army starting October 8 with
the intent that if Musharraf won the presidency and resigned his military post,
Kayani would become chief of the army. Meanwhile, Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed
stated that officials agreed to grant Benazir Bhutto amnesty versus pending
corruption charges. She has emphasized the smooth transition and return to civilian
rule and has asked Pervez Musharaf to shed uniform. On October 5, 2007, Musharraf
signed the National Reconciliation Ordinance, giving amnesty to Bhutto and other
political leaders—except exiled former premier Nawaz Sharif—in all
court cases against them, including all corruption charges. The Ordinance came
a day before Musharraf faced the crucial presidential poll. Both Bhutto's opposition
party, the PPP, and the ruling PMLQ, were involved in negotiations beforehand
about the deal. In return, Bhutto and the PPP agreed not to boycott the Presidential
election. On October 6, 2007, Musharraf won a parliamentary election for President.
However, the Supreme Court ruled that no winner can be officially proclaimed
until it finishes deciding on whether it was legal for Musharraf to run for
President while remaining Army General. Bhutto's PPP party did not join the
other opposition parties' boycott of the election, but did abstain from voting.
Later, Bhutto demanded security coverage on-par with the President's. Bhutto
also contracted foreign security firms for her protection.
Bhutto was well aware of the risk to her own life that might result from her return
from exile to campaign for the leadership position. In an interview on September
28, 2007, with reporter Wolf Blitzer of CNN, she readily admitted the possibility
of attack on herself.
After eight years in exile in Dubai and London, Bhutto returned to Karachi
on October 18, 2007, to prepare for the 2008 national elections.
En route to a rally in Karachi on October 18, 2007, two explosions occurred
shortly after Bhutto had landed and left Jinnah International Airport. She was
not injured but the explosions, later found to be a suicide-bomb attack, killed
136 people and injured at least 450. The dead included at least 50 of the security
guards from her PPP who had formed a human chain around her truck to keep potential
bombers away, as well as 6 police officers. A number of senior officials were
injured. Bhutto, after nearly 10 hours of the parade through Karachi, ducked
back down into the steel command center to remove her sandals from her swollen
feet, moments before the bomb went off. She was escorted unharmed from the scene.
Bhutto later claimed that she had warned the Pakistani government that suicide
bomb squads would target her upon her return to Pakistan and that the government
had failed to act. She was careful not to blame Pervez Musharraf for the attacks,
accusing instead "certain individuals [within the government] who abuse
their positions, who abuse their powers" to advance the cause of Islamic
militants. Shortly after the attempt on her life, Bhutto wrote a letter to Musharraf
naming four persons whom she suspected of carrying out the attack. Those named
included Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, a rival PML-Q politician and chief minister
of Pakistan's Punjab province, Hamid Gul, former director of the Inter-Services
Intelligence, and Ijaz Shah, the director general of the Intelligence Bureau,
another of the country’s intelligence agencies. All those named are close
associates of General Musharraf. Bhutto has a long history of accusing parts
of the government, particularly Pakistan’s premier military intelligence
agencies, of working against her and her party because they oppose her liberal,
secular agenda. Bhutto claimed that the ISI has for decades backed militant
Islamic groups in Kashmir and in Afghanistan. She was protected by her vehicle
and a "human cordon" of supporters who had anticipated suicide attacks
and formed a chain around her to prevent potential bombers from getting near
her. The total number of injured, according to PPP sources, stood at 1000, with
at least 160 dead (The New York Times claims 134 dead and about 450 injured).
A few days later, Bhutto's lawyer Senator Farooq H. Naik said he received a
letter threatening to kill his client. The letter also claims to have links
with al-Qaeda and followers of Osama bin Laden.
On November 3, 2007, President Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency,
citing actions by the Supreme Court of Pakistan and religious extremism in the
nation. Bhutto returned to the country, interrupting a visit to family in Dubai.
She was greeted by supporters chanting slogans at the airport. After staying
in her plane for several hours she was driven to her home in Lahore, accompanied
by hundreds of supporters. While acknowledging that Pakistan faced a political
crisis, she noted that Musharraf's declaration of emergency, unless lifted,
would make it very difficult to have fair elections. She commented that "The
extremists need a dictatorship, and dictatorship needs extremists."
On November 8, 2007, Bhutto was placed under house arrest just a few hours
before she was due to lead and address a rally against the state of emergency.
During a telephone interview with National Public Radio in the United States,
Ms. Bhutto said "I have freedom of movement within the house. I don't have
freedom of movement outside the house. They've got a heavy police force inside
the house, and we've got a very heavy police force - 4,000 policemen around
the four walls of my house, 1,000 on each. They've even entered the neighbors'
house. And I was just telling one of the policemen, I said 'should you be here
after us? Shouldn't you be looking for Osama bin Laden?' And he said, 'I'm sorry,
ma'am, this is our job. We're just doing what we are told.'"
The following day, the Pakistani government announced that Bhutto's arrest
warrant had been withdrawn and that she would be free to travel and to appear
at public rallies. However, leaders of other opposition political parties remained
prohibited from speaking in public.
On November 24, 2007, Bhutto filed her nomination papers for January's Parliamentary
elections; two days later, she filed papers in the Larkana constituency for two
regular seats. She did so as former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, following
seven years of exile in Saudi Arabia, made his much-contested return to Pakistan
and bid for candidacy.
When sworn in again on November 30, 2007, this time as a civilian president
after relinquishing his post as military chief, Musharraf announced his plan
to lift the Pakistan's state of emergency rule on December 16. Bhutto welcomed
the announcement and launched a manifesto outlining her party's domestic issues.
Bhutto told journalists in Islamabad that her party, the PPP, would focus on
"the five E's": employment, education, energy, environment, equality.
On December 4, 2007, Bhutto met with Nawaz Sharif to publicize their demand
that Musharraf fulfill his promise to lift the state of emergency before January's
parliamentary elections, threatening to boycott the vote if he failed to comply.
They promised to assemble a committee which would present to Musharraf the list
of demands upon which their participation in the election was contingent.
On December 8, 2007, three unidentified gunmen stormed Bhutto's PPP office
in the southern western province of Baluchistan. Three of Bhutto's supporters
were killed.
On December 27, 2007, Bhutto was killed while leaving a campaign rally for the
PPP at Liaquat National Bagh, where she had given a spirited address to party
supporters in the run-up to the January 2008 parliamentary elections. After entering
her bulletproof vehicle, Bhutto stood up through its sunroof to wave to the crowds.
At this point, a gunman fired shots at her and subsequently explosives were detonated
near the vehicle killing approximately 20 people. Bhutto was critically wounded
and was rushed to Rawalpindi General Hospital. She was taken into surgery at 17:35
local time, and pronounced dead at 18:16.
Bhutto's body was flown to her hometown of Garhi Khuda Bakhsh in Larkana District,
Sindh, and was buried next to her father in the family mausoleum at a ceremony
attended by hundreds of thousands of mourners.
There was some disagreement about the exact cause of death. Bhutto's husband
refused to permit an autopsy or post-mortem examination to be carried out. On
December 28, 2007, the Interior Ministry of Pakistan stated that "Bhutto
was killed when she tried to duck back into the vehicle, and the shock waves
from the blast knocked her head into a lever attached to the sunroof, fracturing
her skull". However, a hospital spokesman stated earlier that she had suffered
shrapnel wounds to the head and that this was the cause of her death. Benazir
Bhutto's aides have also disputed the Interior Ministry's account. On December
31st, CNN posted the alleged emergency room admission report as a PDF file.
The document appears to have been signed by all the admitting physicians and
notes that no object was found inside the wound.
Al-Qaeda commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazid claimed responsibility for the attack,
describing Benazir Bhutto as "the most precious American asset." The
Pakistani government also stated that it had proof that al-Qaeda was behind
the assassination. A report for CNN stated: "the Interior Ministry also
earlier told Pakistan's Geo TV that the suicide bomber belonged to Lashkar i
Jhangvi — an al-Qaeda-linked militant group that the government has blamed
for hundreds of killings". The government of Pakistan claimed Baitullah
Mehsud was the mastermind behind the assassination. Lashkar i Jhangvi, a Wahabi
Muslim extremist organization affiliated with al-Qaeda that also attempted in
1999 to assassinate former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, is alleged to have been
responsible for the killing of the 54-year-old Benazir Bhutto along with approximately
20 bystanders, however this is vigorously disputed by the Bhutto family, by
the PPP that Benazir Bhutto had headed and by Baitullah Mehsud. On January 3,
2008, President Musharraf officially denied participating in the assassination
of Benazir Bhutto as well as failing to provide her proper security.
After the assassination, there were initially a number of riots resulting in approximately
20 deaths, of whom three were police officers. Around 250 cars were burnt; angry
and upset supporters of Benazir Bhutto threw rocks outside the hospital where
she was being held.. Through December 29, 2007, the Pakistani government said
rioters had wrecked nine election offices, 176 banks, 34 gas stations, 72 train
cars, 18 rail stations, and hundreds of cars and shops. Nawaz Sharif, the leader
of the rival opposition party Pakistan Muslim League (N), stated that "This
is a tragedy for her party, and a tragedy for our party and the entire nation."
President Musharraf decreed a three-day period of mourning.
On December 30, 2007, at a news conference following a meeting of the PPP leadership,
Benazir Bhutto's widower Asif Ali Zardari and son Bilawal Bhutto Zardari announced
that 19-year-old Bilawal will succeed his mother as titular head of the party,
with his father effectively running the party until his son completes his studies
at Christ Church, Oxford. "When I return, I promise to lead the party as
my mother wanted me to," Bilawal said. The PPP called for parliamentary
elections to take place as scheduled on January 8, 2008, and Asif Ali Zardari
said that vice-chair Makhdoom Amin Fahim would probably be the party's candidate
for prime minister. (Bilawal is not of legal age to stand for parliament.)
On December 30, Benazir Bhutto's political party, the Pakistan Peoples Party
(PPP), called for the UK Government and the United Nations to help conduct the
investigation of her death. Bilawal Bhutto has been appointed chairman of his
late mother's opposition political party in Pakistan. Bilawal is only 19 years
old. On February 5, 2008 the PPP released Ms Bhutto's political will which she
wrote two weeks before returning to Pakistan and only 12 weeks before she was
killed, stating that her husband Asif Ali Zardari would be the leader of the
party, until a new leader is elected.
The international reaction to Benazir Bhutto's assassination was of strong
condemnation across the international community. The UN Security Council held
an emergency meeting and unanimously condemned the assassination. Arab League
Secretary General Amr Moussa stated that, "We condemn this assassination
and terrorist act, and pray for God Almighty to bless her soul." India's
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said he was "deeply shocked and horrified
to hear of the heinous assassination of Mrs. Benazir Bhutto. [...] My heartfelt
condolences go to her family and the people of Pakistan who have suffered a
grievous blow." British Prime Minister Gordon Brown stated, "Benazir
Bhutto may have been killed by terrorists but the terrorists must not be allowed
to kill democracy in Pakistan and this atrocity strengthens our resolve that
terrorists will not win there, here or anywhere in the world." European
Commission President José Manuel Barroso condemned the assassination
as "an attack against democracy and against Pakistan," and "[hopes]
that Pakistan will remain firmly on track for return to democratic civilian
rule." U.S. President George W. Bush condemned the assassination as a "cowardly
act by murderous extremists," and encouraged Pakistan to "honor Benazir
Bhutto's memory by continuing with the democratic process for which she so bravely
gave her life." Vatican Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone expressed the
sadness of Pope Benedict XVI, saying that "the Holy Father expresses sentiments
of deep sympathy and spiritual closeness to the members of her family and to
the entire Pakistani nation." Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Qin
Gang said that China was "shocked at the killing of Pakistan's opposition
leader Benazir Bhutto" and "strongly condemns the terrorist attack."
British detectives were asked by the Pakistan Government to investigate the
assassination. Although expressing reservations as to the difficulty in investigating
due to the crime scene having been hosed down and Asif Zardari refusing permission
for a post mortem, they announced on 8 February 2008 that Benazir Bhutto had
been killed by impact with the knob on the sun roof following the bomb explosion.
Benazir Bhutto's books
- Benazir Bhutto, (1983), Pakistan: The
gathering storm.
- Benazir Bhutto (1989). Daughter of the
East.
Daughter of the East
was also released as:
- Benazir Bhutto (1989). Daughter of Destiny:
An Autobiography. At the time of Benazir
Bhutto's death, the manuscript for her third book, to be called Reconciliation:
Islam, Democracy and the West, had been received by publishers. The book,
written with Mark Siegel, was published in February 2008.
- Benazir Bhutto (2008). Reconciliation:
Islam, Democracy, and the West.
