Benazir's balderdash By Brian Cloughley

[pakfame]

London's Sunday Telegraph of July 22 carried an intriguing article by Benazir Bhutto. It wasn't interesting because of political content: in fact it wasn't interesting in any intellectual sense. It was bizarre and maudlin and commercially attractive because of its schmaltzy misrepresentations and facile clawing at the hearts of the British public which has become so emotive that almost any glamorous figure with a tale to tell can jerk their ephemeral and moronic tears. For Benazir - "the living foreign clone of Diana, the late Princess of Wales" - possesses glamour in the starry eyes of sadly ignorant Brits; even, it appears, in the eyes of supposedly sophisticated Telegraph readers.

When John Burns, the Pulitzer-winning New York Times' journalist, was investigating the Bhutto riches he took the trouble to visit me in Scotland to discuss matters, including the machinations of a former Chief of Naval Staff who is now paying mildly for his sins. But who encouraged the CNS to sin, I ask you? Who was the then prime minister who abolished the independent commission advising on the submarine purchase? Who was it that suggested that the now-imprisoned admiral should share the ill-gotten bribes? (Mind you: what country paid le pot de vin? Any comment in the European Union about that? Don't make me laugh.) The main point is that Burns wrote an excoriating article - "thousands of words appeared in the world's most influential newspaper" - on Benazir and her husband, showing beyond doubt that there was corruption in and about every corpuscle in the body politic. There were a few protests from Benazir's supporters, but the evidence was so overwhelming that it could be neither ignored nor disputed. You can imagine that the lawyers of the New York Times went through every one of Burns' points with the finest of toothcombs to avoid the possibility of a libel action. But there was not even a hint of legal proceedings. There was amazing corruption. The country was being milked dry in the most disgusting fashion. It was all true. It was incontrovertible. The facts were there: stark, squalid, and irrefutable.

The years go by, of course, and some memories dim. But one wonders if they dim to the point that we should be deemed terminally forgetful and totally stupid. Even Benazir, in her weird and wonderful apologia (titled 'My family is being torn apart')) in the Telegraph, is not sure if memories and assurances are all that they should be. Take this gem, for example, when she writes that "The military regime concocted a false narcotics-related offence to draw in Britain, claiming that my husband bought a 2.5 million (pound) property in Surrey called Rockwood. Perhaps he did, although he tells me otherwise." Let us examine this statement, made in a first-person article, prominent in the 'Review' pages of a distinguished British newspaper, carrying a large (ten by six inches) professionally excellent, superbly-posed and very attractive photograph of Ms Bhutto with her children, taken by Karan Kapoor of Camera Press.

Benazir, who emphasises in her sick-making piece that she loves and trusts her husband, admits that "perhaps he did" spend two and a half million pounds to buy a house in Surrey, although he denies this to his wife. Now come along, my Lady: either you trust your husband or you do not. Of course it could be that the sum of 2.5 million pounds is so trifling that it escaped his mind. And it might be that to some husbands and wives the sum of 2.5 million pounds is so tiny as to be ignored in conversation. Bit doubtful, though, wouldn't you think?

"Oh, incidentally, Lovey, I bought a place called Rockwood or Rookwood, can't remember which; it cost two and a half million and I've told the local pub owner I want to buy his place too; it's pretty quaint; lots of room for the ponies, and you and the kids, too, of course."

"Oh, darling, I'm so glad. I mean two and a half million these days simply can't buy anything: look at your daddy's new house in Islamabad, it cost about the same, didn't it?"

"No, you stupid bag; I'm talking pounds, not rupees."

Then there is the polo-playing Zardari.In the Sunday Telegraph Benazir says that before they were married he was "a fun-loving, polo-playing, disco-going, spoilt son of wealthy parents." Aherrm. Now he may have been fun-loving. But polo-playing? Has anyone actually seen the lad as a member of a team that did anything? I never heard of Asif Zardari on the circuit. But of course I could be mistaken, as could all my friends. Then I could be mistaken, too, about Benazir's claim that her husband taught the children to play polo. Benazir's children (bless their hearts, for they are pure, and their mother should keep them out of her vile politics), have been brought into the tear-jerking circus of their mother's attempts at self-rehabilitation. Allegedly "they write about the things they'd like to do with him when he's free, such as swimming and horse-riding. They share a passion for horses and he used to teach them polo." Now hang on, BB: the last time that hubby could have taught them polo was when they were barely out of their prams. You might want to portray him as a great family man, but forget this try-on, dearie.

BB is at her most ludicrous when she complains about the lot of women in Pakistan. She is quite correct when she states that their lives are awful - "I would say worse than media review in some parts of the country" - but when in power did she attempt to do anything about this state of affairs? No. Not one piece of legislation was brought forward by her that would have improved the lives of downtrodden, persecuted women. She is emotional about their plight. A woman, she writes, can be "stoned to death if she walks out on an abusive husband." Now hang about: I am well aware that dreadful, wicked things happen to women in Pakistan, but when was the last case of a woman being stoned to death? Let me remind you that when BB took over in 1988 there were some 1150 women in jail for having been raped. (The figure was calculated by a diplomatic mission in Islamabad.) Do you know who took action to have them - "or at least some of them" - released? It was not Ms Benazir Bhutto, the doyenne of women's rights: it was, of all people, Nawaz Sharif, in what was probably the only disinterested and principled action of his life, who set some of them free.

Then there is hubby again. "To his credit and courage, Asif has never interfered with my work and I never interfered in his." OK, we believe this. Until a few paragraphs later when she writes, "In 1996, towards the end of my second term as Prime Minister, I appointed Asif Minister for Investment." One can but feel pity for the poor woman if she is so dumb as to imagine that "never interfering" in her husband's life can exclude her act of making him a minister in the government of which she was head.

What were the qualifications of Mr Zardari for the appointment? Was he familiar with the investment world? (Stop laughing. Stop it at once and please pay attention.) Perhaps he had an economics degree and followed this by working hard for some years in international banks. Then maybe he put his experience to good use by serving with the International Monetary Fund, for example. But no, none of these: he was, in the words of the person who made him the country's Investment Minister, "a fun-loving, disco-going, spoilt son of wealthy parents." His sole qualification for being a minister was that he was married to the person in whose gift the appointment lay. Do you know what this did to international confidence in Pakistan? After they had wiped the tears of mirth from their eyes, every commercial counsellor in diplomatic missions in Islamabad sent a cable home to say For Pete's sake don't invest a cent in Pakistan. Do you remember the reaction in the country at the time? It verged from howls of laughter to wails of despair, and capital outflow accelerated dramatically and drastically. If there was one incident that did most to destroy overseas and domestic confidence in Ms Bhutto's judgment it was the Investment Minister debacle.

One could go on in much more detail concerning the dreadful farrago of emotional claptrap that appeared in an important British newspaper. It might impress the people-who-lunch in London, but it is pathetic stuff to anyone with even the slightest knowledge of Pakistan. Ms Bhutto says she admires democracy, but she has little aptitude for telling the truth, and much for gilding the fading lily.