The Hindu : Front Page : Benazir’s niece not for dynastic politics

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Benazir’s niece not for dynastic politics

Sunny Sebastian

If there is a new generation and new voices in my country, I will be happy, says Fatima Bhutto

— Photo: Gopal Sunger

Fatima Bhutto with author William Dalrymple at the Jaipur Literature Festival on Thursday.

JAIPUR: Fatima Bhutto, niece of the assassinated former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and the much talked about “natural successor” to the Bhutto legacy in Pakistan, has expressed her aversion to the mantle.

“Dynasty politics leads to in-breeding. I don’t believe in it. Nothing good comes out of it,” she said here on Thursday, adding, “I am not interested in being a symbol for anyone.”

The young journalist and writer, in the course of a talk with celebrated author William Dalrymple at the ongoing Jaipur Literature Festival, denounced the succession rights her countrymen wanted to bestow on her at the age of 27. She said she was aware of the constraints in being a politician.

Yet Ms. Bhutto, the daughter of Benazir’s slain brother Murtaza, did not say an emphatic “no” to politics and said what she was doing now was writing about politics. “I am political through my writings. There are things which we can’t say as politicians.”

On another occasion, she, however, said she could consider playing a bigger role in politics if the route was not through her family name.

“I will only consider it if the field is not restricted to the dynasty. If there is a new generation and new voices in my country, I will be happy,” said Ms. Bhutto, brought up in Damascus by her family in exile. “We place too much importance on names,” she observed. Ms. Bhutto, author of 8.50 a.m. 8 October 2005, a book on the earthquake that hit India and Pakistan, termed the countries “twins,” but refused to take a suggestion from the audience that the Partition was a mistake.

She was emphatic about the freedom enjoyed by writers in her country but said the culture of violence should change. “It is very tragic. It is very frightening. If we want to foster democracy, we should shun violence,” she said.

“I knew Benazir. She herself was fighting the dictatorship of the time. I remember her as a woman who would sit by me and read me stories,” she said about the person she used to call “Wadi bua,” the name for her father’s elder sister in their native Sindhi language. There were fond references to candies, the fuzzy green ice cream soda they shared and the threat to call the dentist when she got naughty as a four-year-old.

But Ms. Bhutto, who spoke at length about the “assassination” of her father Murtaza, indicted the then government, headed by her aunt, for the dastardly act.

Ms. Bhutto said that after her father was shot he was left to bleed along with other victims for 45 minutes. He was then taken to a dispensary and not a hospital.

“We were told that those who did the job were dacoits. All the assassins were arrested but now they are highly placed police officials in Pakistan.”

“The policemen were all cleared of the charges and 11 years later they received double and treble promotions,” she noted.

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