World | Pakistan
Zardari could emerge kingmaker
Leadership void presents immediate challenge for Pakistan Peoples Party.
- By Farhan Bokhari, Financial Times
- Published: 01:16 December 30, 2007
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Karachi: Memories of the heavy price paid by Benazir Bhutto's family throughout the country's turbulent history rankled as thousands of activists from her Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) converged in a remote part of Sindh province for her funeral.
Bhutto's final resting place - her family's ancestral cemetery in the village of Garhi Khuda Baksh outside the Bhutto hometown of Larkana - is also that of her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the former prime minister and founder of the PPP, and her two brothers, Murtaza and Shah Nawaz.
But looming over the funeral on Friday was the question of who would rise to replace Bhutto at the helm of the PPP and what impact her death would have on the party's fortunes in the January 8 elections, should they go ahead as planned.
"For the moment, the PPP faces a major crisis," said one party leader. "It has to decide exactly how to fill the leadership void and also retain the support of the masses across the grass roots of Pakistani politics," he said.
The move to formally appoint a successor to Bhutto is unlikely to begin before next week. Analysts said Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto's husband, will play a key role as kingmaker or leader.
"The structure of the PPP is such that it has been built up as a party where the Bhutto family had a key role. For the foreseeable future, Asif Zardari's role cannot be ignored," said Shafqat Mahmood, a former Bhutto aide.
Besides Zardari, Amin Fahim, the most senior PPP leader after Bhutto, and Aitzaz Ahsan, the charismatic lawyer and former interior minister, are expected to be leading contenders. It is not entirely true that the dynasty is finished. Zardari and Bhutto have three children, the eldest of whom, their 19-year-old son, is a student at Oxford. But Bilawal Zardari carries his father's surname and has spent a large part of his life outside Pakistan.
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