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duet can end Pakistan's role as a haven for Taliban fighters battling our
troops just over the border in Afghanistan's Kandahar province. Well, we
should remember that it was during her second attempt at being prime
minister in the early 1990s and with her agreement that the Taliban was
created from among Afghan refugees and dispatched through the mountains to
take power in Kabul. [See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-Services_Intelligence]

The story of the Bhuttos begins with Benazir's father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto,
the son of a wealthy feudal landlord. He entered politics in 1958 as a
minister in the military government of Muhammad Ayub Khan, but resigned a
decade later to found the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), which Benazir
Bhutto now leads.

In 1971 he became president and swung Pakistan towards socialism and Islamic
fundamentalism. All key industries were nationalized and he introduced into
the constitution, which Pakistan's founders had wanted to be a secular
document, several contentious Islamic religious elements.

He also oversaw the start of Pakistan's secret and successful efforts to
make nuclear weapons, which have made the country perhaps the most important
source of nuclear weapons proliferation.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto became increasingly unpopular and in 1977 he was ousted
and arrested in a coup led by Gen. Zia-ul-Haq. Bhutto was accused of
ordering the murder of a political opponent, sentenced to death and hanged
in April 1979.

Bhutto married an Iranian Kurdish woman, Nusrat Ispahani, in 1951. They had
two sons, Murtaza and Shanawaz, and two daughters, Benazir and Sanam.

The two sons were exiled after the 1977 coup and Shanawaz was poisoned by an
unknown murderer in France in 1985. Murtaza spent 16 years in exile, first
in Syria and later in Afghanistan where the Soviet Union's puppet government
embraced the young man who called himself a left-wing revolutionary.

After Gen. Zia died in a mysterious air crash in 1988, Murtaza Bhutto
returned to Pakistan, but was promptly jailed for the 1981 hijacking of an
airliner in which a passenger was killed.

Meanwhile, Benazir, her mother and sister were imprisoned by Zia and then
sent into exile. Benazir established a branch of her father's PPP in London
and returned to Pakistan in 1986 when she attracted, as she did last week,
huge crowds.

She became prime minister after December 1988 elections, but was dismissed
by the president the following August for corruption and mismanagement.

She returned to power after July 1993 elections, but by this time a serious
political schism had developed with her brother and political rival Murtaza.
This became all the more bitter because their mother, Nusrat, sided with
Murtaza.

This problem came to an abrupt end in 1996 when Murtaza and six supporters
were gunned down in Karachi.

Inevitably, fingers were pointed at Benazir, but more persistently at her
husband Asif Zardari, who was charged with Murtaza's murder, but the case
dissolved in confusion.

Nasty things have a habit of happening to people around Zardari. In 1990 he
was arrested and imprisoned for allegedly strapping a remote control bomb to
the leg of a businessman and instructing him to go and empty his bank
account.

Benazir got Zardari out of prison that time because she wanted him in her
cabinet, where he became known as "Mister Ten Percent," his price for
arranging government contracts. The Polish, French and several Middle
Eastern governments have provided detailed accounts of some of Zardari's
kickback operations.

This was a healthy business despite the wreckage inflicted on the Pakistani
economy by the Bhutto administration and the couple are reported by Swiss
bankers to now have $1.5 billion US in various accounts.

After Benazir was again removed from the prime ministership by the president
in 1996 for corruption and incompetence a whole raft of charges were
launched against both her and her husband.

Zardari was in prison from 1997 until 2004 facing charges of corruption and
murder. These charges weren't proved, but he was arrested again in late 2004
for the alleged murder of a judge and his son in 1996.

Those charges also never fully materialized and Zardari went into exile.

A Swiss court has found the couple guilty of money-laundering and given them
six-month suspended prison sentences.

As part of the deal by which she returned to Pakistan last week, Benazir
Bhutto insisted that Musharraf dismiss all outstanding corruption charges
against her.

It is hard to imagine that with this saga as prelude, Pakistan can become a
happy and prosperous democracy with Benazir Bhutto again in power.

jmanthorpe at png.canwest.com