Well, he’s back. After much speculation that Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is going to take a back seat for sister Asifa, who was looking more and more like the heir apparent, the PPP chairperson gave a much talked about speech the other day.
Taking clear swipes at the Sher, the Tsunami and He Who Lives in London, the political scion ruffled quite a few feathers. It wasn’t as great a speech as could have been because of his extremely pronounced linguistic and accent limitations, but it would certainly have revved up worker morale. As his oratorical skills stand at the moment, even a sub-district president of his People’s Student Federation would be able to run circles around him but still, a start.
It remains to be seen, however, whether he would be able stick it out in the mean streets of Pakistani politics.
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Hell hath no fury like a Pakistani hack unsuccessfully looking for a freebie. As part of the austerity drive of the new government, the journalist community has not been taken on any junket abroad.
This had to be grumpily accepted by the tribe of scribes. Who could find fault with austerity? But now, with the president having taken a large entourage with him to perform Hajj on government expense, the tongues are finally wagging, and the pens are finally scribbling and the keyboards are finally… Ok, you get it.
But wag and scribble they should! The metaphysics of performing the ritual on government expense notwithstanding, such extravagance really is a bit jarring during times of such much publicized attempts at frugality.
The battle for Pakistan is in the Punjab which is 62 per cent of the country. Haranguing a few hundred supporters in Karachi is not good enough for Bilawal. Get together a crowd of a hundred thousand at the Minar in Lahore and talk to them. Tell them what YOU PLAN TO DO ! Remember that you are only a party of rural sindh.
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