Not yet clear about whose legacy to follow and what direction to take, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is being pulled in opposite directions. Under the watchful eyes of his aunt and flanked by two maligned former prime ministers of PPP, Bilawal chose the politically emotive soil of Kashmir to launch his lethal tirade against the prime minister. So what is the politics of this third-generation Bhutto? Competing with Imran Khan’s rhetoric, Bilawal has raised the ante with his super anti-India nationalist tirade against a prime minister who is bogged down by Panamagate and is perceived as being squeezed by a dominant military establishment on his ‘friendship with all neighbours’ policy. Bilawal has taken the jingoist course of his grandfather, forgetting that his pacifist mother was also dubbed a ‘security risk’ and Z A Bhutto was hanged, despite having laid down the basis for a confrontationist national security paradigm. Political enmity makes you blind and political expediency makes you opportunistic. This is how Bilawal’s current campaign may be summed up. The nostalgic followers of the original manifesto of Bhutto may be feeling rejuvenated due to the similarity of Bilawal’s two speeches in Kashmir with Z A Bhutto’s clarion call for “thousand years of war” with India. Even if it might not have gone well with young Zardari-Bhutto’s secular stance, the PPP’s former PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf won laurels for him from the crowd when he mentioned how Bhutto solved the Ahmadi issue. Who could have stopped Ashraf from taking credit for an Islamic constitution, the Islamic bomb, the creation of the OIC and the Islamic prohibitions introduced by Bhutto, to revive the dwindling support for the party in Kashmir (due to alleged corruption of the PPP’s outgoing government)? Of course Bilawal is pulling impressive crowds in Kashmir when he dubs the prime minister of his own country to be a lackey of Indian
Prime Minister Modi, detested by Kashmiris so much. This he thinks may also help build fences with the powerful military that must have resented his father’s daring remarks against the ‘deep state’. It seems that, after resenting the increasing role of the paramilitary force in Karachi, the PPP is happy over the beginning of its replay in Punjab. Combined with its otherwise consistent policy against terrorism, peppered with a pro-people critique of Nawaz Sharif’s cosmetic developmental model, Bilawal could begin to revive the PPP’s appeal among various sections in central Punjab – the bastion of the Sharifs’ power. But given the tenuous civilmilitary relations, Bilawal seems to be surpassing Imran Khan in inflicting the ‘most unkindest cuts of all’ on a beleaguered prime minister reeling under the Panama leaks and having given way to the security establishment on the agenda of peace. But Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has been trying to pursue the same agenda for the South Asian region that Shaheed BB and Zardari had been pursing. Surrounded by opportunist hawks and corrupt minders, Bilawal seems to be unable to find his own ground. He is unable to see how his great mother found her own while inheriting a strong populist authoritarian legacy of her father. Bilawal could have followed both BB and Zardari who were on the same pacifist page in peacefully resolving our differences with our neighbours. BB tried to solve the Siachen issue with Rajiv Gandhi and Zardari tried his best to not let the peace process with India get derailed in the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks and even invited the Afghan president to his oath-taking ceremony. Instead of following BB’s paradigm of reconciliation among civilisations and with neighbours, Bilawal is going back to the coldwar times of his maternal grandfather. Although his critique of the Sharifs’ ‘highways development model’ is far more sensible than what Imran Khan says, Bilawal needs to focus on reinventing the PPP’s social-liberal agenda to reach out to the constituency of the poor who are still enamoured with Bhutto name. If he wants to look credible, he will have to first radically change the bad governance of his party’s governments in Sindh and AJK while rightly criticising the Sharifs’ autocratic style of governance. Similarly, he could have taken a high moral ground when asking the PM to resign by asking his own party leaders to vacate party offices till they clear their names from corruption charges. In an earlier article (‘The PPP in doldrums’, Dec 31, 2015), I had discussed how difficult it was for Benazir Bhutto to set her own agenda while holding on to the out-of-date legacy of Z A Bhutto. But she did it, and refashioned the populist but conflicting legacy to suit post-cold war times and a globalised world. On the last leg of her political career, she even gave an out-of-fashion PPP an ideological cause to stand up against religious extremism and promote secular and humanist values. Bilawal has probably inherited these values, which also suit the genius of his cyber-generation. But he will bring those humanist values to shame if he takes a jingoist course to please those who could not even reconcile with a super-nationalist Bhutto whose security paradigm they still follow despite having him hanged. The lessons of history are even more bitter when they become a family history. Bhutto’s populism was extraordinary and dominated the political landscape for over four decades. Despite becoming a victim of military dictatorships and in spite of efforts by some to demonise it, the PPP survived all onslaughts. In the post- BB period, Asif Zardari did provide a stopgap arrangement that he successfully managed by his skilful manoeuvring while analogously misappropriating BB’s paradigm of reconciliation among civilisations and erroneously extending it to political detractors across the dividing-line. Zardari is accused of inflicting a greater damage to Bhuttos’ populism due to his aversion to popular politics and fascination with Machiavellian methods. But that was a genuine limitation since he was not supposed to be a popular leader; and the PPP did lose its popular appeal under him. The task before Bilawal is no less difficult. Lessons from his grandfather, mother and father are in order. He should learn from the mass mobilisation capacities of Z A Bhutto, humanism of his mother and practical wisdom of his father’s worldliness. Yet, the bigger task is to reset a social democratic agenda for a popular centre-left party, and radically restructure his party to provide efficient and good governance with the induction of new blood instead of infusing life in dead horses trying to ride on his young shoulders,. Bilawal must discard Bhutto’s authoritarian tactics and Zardari’s opportunism and instead look at his mother’s politics. While he does express some of those democratic ideals, they can’t be reconciled with the jingoism he is so fondly displaying. He should not disrupt the democratic transition; unlike Imran Khan, he has plenty of time on his side. But he will be seen in light of the company he keeps and will have to distance himself from those who brought a bad name to the PPP. There is a great void in left-liberal politics and there is no one in the mainstream who can fill it. Bilawal has a great opportunity to do so. It all depends on what kind of politics he pursues and what kind of people he is going to bring forward to change the very poor public perception about his party.