Political Saviours and Pakistan

Some politicians achieve legendary status - and indeed, immortality, at least in the mind of the public - through dying. It is also helpful if they die before they can achieve true political power. RFK is a good example, and the fact that Martin Luther King never had to compromise his principles in political office has helped his posthumous reputation to flourish.

Benazir Bhutto is another good example of this phenomenon. Assassinated by a gunman/suicide bomber before she could achieve real political power, she can now live on after her death, never having to disappoint the potential that many felt she had. Yes, she had been Prime Minister, but few could have doubted before Christmas that this was her time, and this was her struggle to fight and maybe even win. Now she is dead she cannot succeed. But equally she cannot fail. Her supporters will hail the fallen Bhutto, and forever wonder what could have been achieved had she lived.

It may be a harsh thing to say so soon after her untimely demise, but such an idealised view of Bhutto is naive at the very least. Bhutto was not the answer to the deep and worrying problems facing Pakistan. It sounds facetious but the very fact someone assassinated her (and tried to on her return to Pakistan as well) shows the depths of hatred some in the country felt for her. Even if she had achieved political power (in the face of strong resistance from the increasingly dictatorial Musharraf) she would have struggled to unite the country. In fact a Bhutto presidency may have been the tipping point into a civil war that still hangs over Pakistan like the sword of Damocles.

The simple truth is that the deep rooted problems of Pakistan can't be solved by one person. The rifts in Pakistani society that are now boiling over have been around since that country gained independence, and arguably before. It is tempting to look at Bhutto and add to the layers of tragedy that surround any untimely death by seeing the assassination as a calamity for Pakistan as well as the Bhutto family. But the sad fact is that Bhutto could not have saved Pakistan.

And the even sadder fact is that it is now difficult to see who will.