Interview: Asif Ali Zardari - A Date With Destiny

This interview with Asif Zardari was conducted at Zardari House in Islamabad some days back. Present but not participating were Ms. Sherry Rehman, the Information Minister and Mr. Rehman Malik an Advisor on Home Affairs, a close confidant of Benazir Bhutto when Asif was incarcerated for 8 years. Zardari has been placed in an enviable position since the assassination of Benazir Bhutto on Dec 27, 2008. He produced a will that made him an interim co chairman of the PPP along with his teenager son Bilawal Zardari as the chairman. He has plunged into the election campaign that saw PPP emerge as the leading party, and has now formed a coalition government in the center.

DC: You have been plunged into an enviable position since Dec. 27, 2007, looking after the party, the election campaign and now the government. How are you enjoying this role?

AZ: I have been thrust in this position unwillingly. It has been a series of very long days and nights since Bibi’s shahadat (assassination). With Bibi’s guidance and Allah’s help I will manage.

DC: It has been alleged you had an easy life in jail with amenities and luxuries accessible day and night.

AZ: (smiling) A jail is still a jail.DC: Critics say you are cashing in on Bhutto’s name.

AZ: My children spontaneously decided to change their names. I had no say in that.

DC: Mumtaz Bhutto has said you will never be a part of the hundred thousand plus Bhutto clan. He also says you are not even a Sindhi.

AZ: He is a has been, disgruntled politician who lives in the past. I would not give much credence to him

DC: Eight months ago in NYC you were inseparable from a cane. You suffer from diabetes and spinal ailments. There have been rumours of a lethal injury, terminal cancer. Today you have discarded the cane. How is your health?

AZ: Alhamdolillah I feel fine. I want to pass off this mantle to Bilawal Bhutto and I hope Allah gives me that much time.

DC: Are you saying you are terminally ill?

AZ: Life is in Allah’s trust. No one knows when one’s time is up.

DC: What was the two point agenda Makhdoom Amin Fahim mentioned to you regarding his selection?

AZ: (smiling) There is no harm in revealing it now. He said 1: select me or 2: do not select me.

DC: There was a lot of speculation regarding the selection of the Prime Minister. By Selecting Yusuf Raza Gillani do you think you have earned your “spurs”?

AZ: Spurs?

DC: On January 9, in an interview you said:

PPP has chosen Makdoom Amin Fahim for Prime Minister if PPP wins. We have taken a decision that all decisions will be by consensus taken by the CEC (central executive committee) on a majority basis. So everybody is bound by that including myself. Nobody can take decisions on their own because when she was there, she was a personality everybody had worked with for 30 years so till we earn our spurs we have to go with the consensus decision. All decisions (including about Fahim) till date have been with everybody included. There have been no dissenting notes in the party.

AZ: The CEC recommended and I endorsed the decision. As for earning the spurs, it will not be easy to pick up Shaheed Mohterma Bibi’s legacy in such a short time.

DC: Will you marry again? Who may be the first lady?

AZ: (smile) If you are asking me if Yusuf Raza Gillani is filling in for me, please ask that directly.

DC: We will ask that also, but this is straight up, will you remarry?

AZ: I am married to the grave of Bibi.

DC: Married to her grave? We have heard that in Sind influential and landed people marry their daughters and sisters to the Qur’an, but to the grave?

AZ: The doctors have given me a limited time. I want to be with Bibi.

DC: That means you will not run for the NA (as a prelude to becoming the PM.)

AZ: (nods and smiles sadly) 

DC: The cases alleging corruption have been removed but what about your involvement in Murtaza Bhutto’s murder? Tariq Ali wrote that Murtaza called you to 70 Clifton and after chastising you had his aides shave off your left moustache.

AZ: Wrong! It was the right one. Can we leave it out of the interview please? But no, does not matter now. I have been implicated on hearsay. His assassination was carried out by "agencies." We were in Islamabad that day.

DC: The Agenda spelled out by PM Gillani is ambitious. It appears to be the first shot at the next elections.

AZ: What is your question? 

DC: He has outlined an impossible task for 100 days. It is as if this coalition would not even last that long and you can use the promises made as a campaign strategy for the next elections.

AZ: We intend to carry out the full mandate of the term, Inshaallah.

DC: Do you see any changes in Pakistan-US relations?

AZ: No, we have common interests in our fight against terrorism. In Pakistan only Pakistanis would fight terrorism.

DC: You would discourage use of NATO or US forces?

AZ: Their forces can be deployed more usefully in other trouble spots.

DC: Will you soften up your Kashmir stand?

AZ: Kashmir is the red herring that affects Pak-India relations. We need an out of box solution can be satisfactory to all three parties to the conflict. 

DC: People say you will now become Mr 20% with inflation adjusted percentage.

AZ: As for my detractors, I can only say may God forgive them for they know not, may God educate them and give them brains because that is one thing that is lacking in Pakistan - commonsense.