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Oxford, political dynasties, and Bilawal

— PHOTO: AP

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: Bilawal Bhutto Zardari.

Oxford has been home to the children of many political dynasties from around the world (though our own went to the “other place”) who have then gone on to perpetuate family rule in their countries.

So, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is in safe hands as he prepares to assume the mantle of the Bhutto clan picking up from where his mother left.

Bilawal, a first-year history student at Christ Church College, has already been active in the Oxford Union, where his mother honed her debating skills and created a history of sorts by being elected as its first Asian woman president in 1977.

That same year, the Cambridge Union also happened to elect a foreign woman as its president — a Greek student called Arianna Huffington and the two became life-long friends. “The anomaly of two foreign women heading the two unions meant that we ended up debating each other around England on topics ranging from British politics to broad generalities about the impact of technological advance on mankind,” Ms Huffington, a writer and syndicated columnist who now lives in America, recalled in her blog.

By a poignant irony, Bilawal could make his public-speaking debut at Oxford at a special debate the Union will hold on January 17 in his mother’s memory. The issue to be debated will be: “This house believes that the ideal state is a secular state.”

Those who know Bilawal say that he speaks “confidently and eloquently” and is someone to watch out for — provided, of course, that his newly-acquired political responsibilities don’t get the better of his university life. Many also find him refreshingly different from a lot of spoilt dynastic “brats” who have passed through Oxford’s hallowed halls. “He’s very charismatic and engaging, he speaks confidently and eloquently. He seems very worldly and aware,” a former Union president Luke Tryl said.

In the two months that Bilawal has been at Oxford he is believed to have gone to some lengths to keep a low profile, calling himself Bilawal Lawalib (Bilawal spelt backwards) to avoid attracting attention by concealing his surname.

All that will change, however, when he returns to the university in his new avatar as head of the Pakistan People’s Party: exit Mr. Lawalib, enter Mr. Bhutto Zardari, Oxford’s newest acquisition in the line of famous political heirs. He will be under constant media spotlight and watched by security services with the possibility of being assigned a personal security detail depending on the threat perception.

“We will review our security arrangements. We take the security of all our students, including high profile students, extremely seriously,” a university spokesman said but declined to discuss individual cases.

However, The Daily Telegraph reported that even his close friends could be dragged into the security net.

“Mr. Bhutto Zardari is said to have formed a close circle of friends, who themselves might be subject to questions from the authorities. Nothing could have been further from his mind when he enrolled in October, accompanied by his proud mother,” it said.

Although Bilawal has been widely described as rather “shy,” it appears that he does know a thing or two about letting his hair down — as he did at Halloween, when, according to The Guardian, he “donned evil horns and painted his face to go out with a group in fancy dress.”

The newspaper reproduced a photograph of Bilawal, wearing “evil horns” on its front page under the headline “From Oxford parties to Pakistan politics.” Apparently, there was a more dramatic picture of the evil-horned Bilawal on a student website and below it he had written: “We’re ready to bring hell on earth…”

In her time at Oxford, Benazir famously drove around in a flashy sports car, often travelling to London just for an ice cream at her favourite Baskin Robbins parlour at Marble Arch, loved partying, and was regarded as a “star.” Later, when she lived in London, she liked a gin and tonic but refused to dance protesting that “good Muslim girls don’t dance with foreign men,” according to journalist Ian Jack.

Bilawal’s carefree days, on the other hand, have been brutally cut short, having been thrust into the firing-line of Pakistan’s murderous politics at such an early age. The decision has surprised Benazir’s friends who say that the last thing she would have wanted was for her son to go through what she did when she was pushed into politics after her father’s execution.

“One thing I know …is that Benazir would want him to finish his studies first,” wrote Victoria Shoefield, her friend from Oxford days.

Reports suggest that Bilawal himself was very reluctant but forced into it. “He didn’t want to do it. He wanted to continue his studies,” Ali Jafri, an uncle, has been reported as saying.

At 19, Bilawal is even younger than his mother was when she was persuaded to take the plunge, as another of Benazir’s friends Mahnaz Malik, writing in The Times, noted pointing out that he “not only faces the pain of the loss of his mother but also the daunting task of surviving the dangerous world of Pakistani politics at a time when his contemporaries only have their first-year exams to worry about.”

The decision has also been attacked on political grounds as a crude attempt to perpetuate the Bhutto dynasty with writer Tariq Ali calling it a “grotesque” and “disgusting medieval charade.” Which only confirms the criticism that for all their claim to be modern and liberal, the Bhuttos remain feudal at heart.

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