'Democracy Is the Greatest Revenge'
PakistanPal
of Pakistan.
By ASIF ALI ZARDARI
Two years ago the world stopped for me and for my children. Pakistan
was shaken to its core and all but came apart. Women everywhere lost
one of their greatest symbols of equality. And Islam, our great
religion, lost its modern face.
Bhutto supporters in Lahore, Pakistan mark the two-year anniversary of
her assassination yesterday.
On Dec. 27, 2007, my wife, Benazir Bhutto, was assassinated. She was
the bravest person I have ever known, and the second anniversary of
her death is an appropriate occasion to reflect upon what she achieved
for our country, and how her legacy must be preserved against those
who would return Pakistan to darkness.
Twice elected prime minister of Pakistan, Benazir had an immense
impact. She stood up and defeated the forces of military dictatorship.
She freed all political prisoners. She ended press censorship. She
legalized trade and student unions, built 46,000 primary and secondary
schools and appointed the first female judges in our history. And she
showed the women of Pakistan and the world that they must accept no
limits on their ability and opportunity to learn, to grow and to lead
in modern society.
The target of two assassination attempts by Osama bin Laden in the
1990s, Benazir repeatedly warned a skeptical world of the impending
danger from extremists and militants. In her last campaign-even on the
very day of her death, by the hands of such extremists-she mobilized
and rallied the people of Pakistan against the terrorist threat.
Benazir's murderers didn't kill her dreams. On the day we buried her,
even as her supporters cried out for revenge, we reminded our party
and country that, in her own words, "democracy is the greatest
revenge." And then we led the Pakistan People's Party to victory in
the elections.
Since then, fulfilling the electoral manifesto she wrote, the nation's
economy, which had been left in shambles by the priorities of a decade
of dictatorship, has been stabilized and revitalized. Food shortages
have ended. Power shortages have diminished. We have adopted a
national curriculum for the first time in history to challenge the
spread of political madrassas. Constitutional reforms are being
finalized which will rid Pakistan of the undemocratic provisions
inserted by military dictators that expanded the power of the
presidency at the expense of parliament.
Benazir Bhutto died confronting the forces of tyranny and terrorism,
and Pakistan remains committed to the struggle that she led. We have
reclaimed Swat and Malakand from the militants and rehabilitated the
displaced persons back into their homes. We have taken the fight
against militants to other areas, including South Waziristan in our
Federally Administered Tribal Areas, and to our major cities, and we
will win this war against them.
We will not let militants violently impose their political agenda on
the people. Political ownership of the war against terrorism rests
with the people of Pakistan for the first time. We are in the front
trenches of this war while the community of nations stands with us.
Much has been accomplished, but it has not been easy for my nation,
for my party or for my family. The forces in Pakistan that have
resisted change, modernity and democracy for 30 years still attempt to
derail progress.
Some of these forces who were allied with dictatorship in the past now
hope that the judicial process can undo the will of a democratic
electorate and destabilize the country. A litany of ancient charges of
corruption-the modus operandi of past plots against every
democratically elected government in Pakistan-now threatens to
undermine the legitimacy of our government.
Those that will not stand with us against terrorism stand against us
in the media. I have spent almost 12 years in prison on trumped up
charges never proven, even by a court system manipulated by dictators
and despots. But like Benazir, I refuse to be intimidated.
So let the legal process move forward. Those of us who have fought for
democracy against dictatorship for decades do not fear justice; we
embrace it.
My ministers, my party, leaders of other parties and thousands of
civil servants across our nation will defend themselves in the courts
if necessary. Democracy has come a long way in Pakistan, and the
People's Party has always been at the vanguard of the fight. In 1979
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Benazir's father and the elected prime minister
of Pakistan was executed under a smokescreen that history now
characterizes as a judicial murder. Two decades later Benazir was
indicted on fabricated charges on the orders of her political enemies
then in power. When tape recordings of these government officials
ordering the courts to fabricate evidence and false witness against
Benazir were made public, these trumped-up charges were dismissed.
Those of us who have been victims of dictatorship in the past believe
in the rule of law and have faith in the judicial process. We believe,
in the words of my wife, that "time, justice and the forces of history
are on our side."
We have not come this far in our democratic struggle to fail. In this
struggle, I am inspired by my father-in-law, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who
said that he "would rather die at the hands of dictators than be
killed by history."
Mr. Zardari is president of Pakistan.
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