Aunt Benazir's false promises

[Disturbed]

Aunt Benazir's false promises

Bhutto's return bodes poorly for Pakistan -- and for democracy there.
By Fatima Bhutto
November 14, 2007

KARACHI -- We Pakistanis live in uncertain times. Emergency rule has been imposed for the 13th time in our short 60-year history. Thousands of lawyers have been arrested, some charged with sedition and treason; the chief justice has been deposed; and a draconian media law -- shutting down all private news channels -- has been drafted.

Perhaps the most bizarre part of this circus has been the hijacking of the democratic cause by my aunt, the twice-disgraced former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto. While she was hashing out a deal to share power with Gen. Pervez Musharraf last month, she repeatedly insisted that without her, democracy in Pakistan would be a lost cause. Now that the situation has changed, she's saying that she wants Musharraf to step down and that she'd like to make a deal with his opponents -- but still, she says, she's the savior of democracy.

The reality, however, is that there is no one better placed to benefit from emergency rule than she is. Along with the leaders of prominent Islamic parties, she has been spared the violent retributions of emergency law. Yes, she now appears to be facing seven days of house arrest, but what does that really mean? While she was supposedly under house arrest at her Islamabad residence last week, 50 or so of her party members were comfortably allowed to join her. She addressed the media twice from her garden, protected by police given to her by the state, and was not reprimanded for holding a news conference. (By contrast, the very suggestion that they might hold a news conference has placed hundreds of other political activists under real arrest, in real jails.)

Ms. Bhutto's political posturing is sheer pantomime. Her negotiations with the military and her unseemly willingness until just a few days ago to take part in Musharraf's regime have signaled once and for all to the growing legions of fundamentalists across South Asia that democracy is just a guise for dictatorship.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-bhutto14nov14,0,2482408.story?coll=la-opinion-center

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

1. Uh huh. Here we go, again.

x(

[malaise]

2. Well it looks like Aunty served a better purpose

for several players and we're still being played.

[Disturbed]

4. I posted a different perspective of this person that is now

being hailed as a Hero for "democracy".

[madrchsod]

8. you too? so did i....

every country has to have an evita...

[malaise]

10. Yep she's Gandhi, she's MLK

and JFK all wrapped in one. This planet sickens me.

[malaise]

9. She is no hero to me

I know when I'm being played

[TomInTib]

3. Now you've gone off and done it, Disturbed.

If you need any back-up from the mob which is surely forming in the street outside your house, let me know and I will hop on the next Ferry.

I can be there in twenty minutes.

[Disturbed]

5. LOL Thanks Tom.

I know that you are a stand up person. Hope you are doing ok.

[TomInTib]

6. I am doing pretty good.

Life threw me a series of curves there for a while, but I got pretty much past it.

I have a fine woman, now, but she lives on the Hudson and I am still in Tiburon. Maybe that is for the best.

If you ever get to this side of the Bay, let me know. I'll buy the first round (or whatever).

[Disturbed]

7. Thanks. I will let you know. I have visited there a few times.

It is a beautiful part of CA. Best to you. :toast: