BB’s assassination

Speaking at Garhi Khuda Baksh on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto accused Pervez Musharraf of being the killer of his mother. He faulted the judiciary too for failing to provide justice but the majority of his ire was reserved for the former dictator. Musharraf’s culpability in the killing of Benazir is strong. He knew the threats she faced and, yet, as an exhaustive UN investigation found, he deliberately did not provide her with the level of security given to members of the government. Even after the suicide attack on her convoy in Karachi, Benazir was not given sufficient security. Then, after her assassination, there was a distinct lack of interest – both by the state and the government – in tracking down the culprits. The scene of the assassination was hosed down before any evidence could be collected. The TTP’s Baitullah Mehsud was blamed but no proof was ever provided. Simply put, Musharraf never intended to provide Benazir the security she needed and he made no effort to catch those responsible. At best, his attitude was that of a man glad that a potential rival had been eliminated.

Still, Bilawal may also want to look inwards. His party assumed power just months after Benazir’s assassination and it too took a curiously off-hand approach to the investigation. It made an alliance with the PML-Q – which after BB’s assassination was described by Asif Zardari as the ‘Qatil League’ – and did not pursue the perpetrators of Benazir’s murder. There has been a lack of consistency in ascribing blame for the murder as well, with Zardari and the PPP at various times apportioning blame for the assassination on Musharraf, on the state, on international actors and on militants.

The matter has been complicated further by a recent ISI report that supposedly claims that Osama bin Laden was behind Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, that he provided the explosives for it and that he even moved to Afghanistan just so he could supervise it. At the same time, the ISI also says that Osama had Musharraf too on his hit list. Interestingly, Musharraf has now said that ‘rogue’ elements within the army were responsible for BB’s killing. In all this, the point is that it was the duty of the PPP – and it has always been the duty of the state – to unravel this conspiracy. The shoddy investigation into the case has always made it difficult to convict anyone for murdering Benazir but there is also the matter of the problematic verdicts that acquitted suspects with known militant ties and convicted two police officers for negligence without trying to ascertain who was giving them orders to hose down the scene of the crime. We may never know who was directly responsible for the murder of Benazir Bhutto. All we have to go by so far are the clues provided by circumstantial evidence and motive. The fact is that Benazir was a twice-elected prime minister and a popular political leader of Pakistan. We as a nation deserve answers about the circumstances of her killing and, above all, to find out who was behind it.