Fatima Bhutto says she will never join PTI

Fatima Bhutto, the renowned writer and granddaughter of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, is not impressed by and still critical of Imran Khan’s revolutionary tsunami, which seems to have swept away many a veteran politicians.

The legendary figure of Bhutto family, the daughter of Murtaza Bhutto, while speaking at the Jaipur Literature Festival on Sunday made it clear that she was not joining Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Amid numerous announcements from political bigwigs that they were joining the PTI, there were rumours that Fatima Bhutto, a ferocious critic of the incumbent government and particularly President Asif Ali Zardari, was also mulling to doing so.

However, Bhutto had quickly responded on microblogging website Twitter, saying that was not even a possibility. “He has an incredible coziness not with the military but with dictatorship,” she tweeted.

“I rubbished this ludicrous rumour days ago. No means no people: I am not. I will not. Let me go so far as to say, I will never,” she tweeted on December 28.

She accused Imran of defending the legacy of former dictator General Ziaul Haq, who came to power in the late 1970s after overthrowing former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Fatima’s grandfather and the founder of the country’s ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).

Fatima said that Imran had an incredible cosiness not with the military but with the dictatorship. She also stated that it was Imran Khan who supported General Pervez Musharraf in a 2002 referendum, allowing him to extend his term.

In what appeared to be a well- practiced argument to deflate the political credibility of the cricketer-turned politician, she went on to list more reasons why she opposed his political incursion.

She explained Imran Khan’s opposition to amending a 2006-women’s bill in favour of survivors of rape, raising question about Imran’s commitment to secularism and to defending minorities. She observed, “As a woman I worry very much about Imran’s politics. Is he a saviour? No, I don’t think so,” she added

Fatima Bhutto shared a stage with Pakistani-American historian Ayesha Jalal at the literary festival. Her tone was one of disillusionment with Pakistan’s political lot.

She spoke of the “gulf” that exists between the people in power and the rest of the country, saying that food scarcity, not quarrel between institutions, is the bigger problem for most people.

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Posted by Faisal Farooq on Jan 23 2012. Filed under Latest News, Pakistan, Politics, Society. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.