Benazir would be ‘concerned’ at today’s PPP

LONDON: The director of an award-winning documentary on the life of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto has said that if the slain leader was alive today, she would be “highly concerned” at the state of affairs of Pakistan and the direction of the PPP under President Asif Ali Zardari’s stewardship.

Producer/director Duane Baughman spoke to The News at the London screening of the film where he was joined on stage by Producer Mark Siegel, the lobbyist in Washington who was close to Benazir.

A Duane Baughman film “Bhutto” is co-directed by Johnny O’Hara and produced by Duane Baughman, Arleen Sorkin, Mark Siegel and Amy Berg.

When asked if he would take a trip to Pakistan to promote the film, Daughman gave a convoluted answer, indicating that they had no such plan.

It is believed that the producer had finalised plans to be present at the opening of the film in Pakistan but they scrapped their plans after the kidnapping in Karachi two weeks ago of London-based business tycoon Riaz Laljee, who is also a close business partner of the president.

The 115-minute film, which details the rise of Benazir Bhutto to power from childhood to her mysterious and unresolved assassination in Rawalpindi, ends abruptly without asking any critical questions to those believed to know the key facts behind Liaquat Bagh assassination.

Referring to President Zardari’s speech in last December that he knew who the killers of Benazir Bhutto were and he would expose them, The News asked why they had not used the $3 million documentary film to give clear hints, Mark Siegel said that President Zardari had made no such statement and he believed the president, while in power, would do everything to expose the killers.

He also confirmed that the president had not shared with him any knowledge of his intelligence on Benazir’s killers.

Baughman, who decided to make the film on Benazir Bhutto’s life three weeks after her murder, said Benazir was a magnificent personality whose life and struggle against impossible odds, needed to be chronicled.

During his research and making the movie, Baughman discovered that Benazir’s family story was something out of a Greek tragedy “with unsolved murders, political intrigue, family feuds, hijackings, poisonings you name it”.

Daughman, who was facilitated by giving full access to Benazir’s children and close aides, said he had used his own money to make the film and didn’t take any help from the government.

Siegel said Benazir was a fighter who loved taking up challenges and had a passion for the poor people of Pakistan. He said that her story had a global relevance and would resonate with the world audience.

The film, largely containing tributes, interviews of Victoria Schofield, Christina Lamb, Reza Aslan, London-based left wing intellectual Tariq Ali, Benazir’s uncle Ahmad Ispahani, Steve Coll, Arianna Huffington, Shuja Nawaz, Pakistan’s High Commissioner to the UK Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan’s Ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani, Akbar Ahmed, Peter Galbraith, Mark Siegel, former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, former president Pervez Musharraf, sister Sanam Bhutto and niece Fatima Bhutto.