The Man Who Could Rule Pakistan ; Bhutto's Widower Emerges As a Major Player in the Power Calculus As He Wards Off Challenges and Steers Ppp to a Possible Electoral Victory
Summary
By Raj Chengappa and Hasan Zaidi in Pakistan
The quickest way to get to the Bhutto ancestral house in Naudero is to take a flight from Karachi to Mohenjodaro--a name that has been seared into every Indian and Pakistani school child's memory as the fount of the 5,000-year-old Indus Valley Civilisation. The airport is located bang next to the impressive ruins, but barring the wide tarmac highway, the provincial stronghold of Pakistan's most famous political dynasty appears locked away in time. The landscape is dotted with mud and brick houses. Donkey carts laden with hay trudge across wheat and sugarcane fields and the guide quips that "the Indus Civilisation had better drains than what we have here".See the full content of this document
Extract
The Man Who Could Rule Pakistan ; Bhutto's Widower Emerges As a Major Player in the Power Calculus As He Wards Off Challenges and Steers Ppp to a Possible Electoral Victory
Ever since the assassination of Benazir Bhutto on December 27, Larkana district has been overwhelmed by the continuous stream of visitors that pours into the feudal farmhouse to offer condolences to her widower Asif Zardari and to wail and weep at the massive Mughal-style mausoleum nearby, where her mortal remains lie buried next to that of her equally famous father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. The Bhutto tribe itself is one of the largest in Sindh and so vast are its landholdings that locals say, if you have to travel from one end to the other, you have to cross several railway stations. But it is not just Sindhi tribesman with embroidered skull caps who come to meet Zardari. Leaders from almost every end of the political spectrum, including Nawaz Sharif, once Bhutto's arch rival, have come to engage with the man everybody says could rule Pakistan if elections are held ...
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