Benazir Bhutto, exiled former prime minister of Pakistan, will deliver the Fall Convocation address at Elon University at 6 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 18, in Alumni Gymnasium. Bhutto’s convocation address is the keynote of a Globalization Symposium that celebrates the dedication of the Isabella Cannon Centre for International Studies in the recently renovated Carlton building.
Bhutto recently announced plans to run for re-election in October, despite new laws enacted by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf which give him five more years in office and the power to dismiss parliament. Musharraf has threatened to have Bhutto arrested and jailed if she returns to Pakistan in a bid for office.
In an Aug. 2 story in the Financial Times of London Bhutto accused Musharraf of backing the Taliban regime until the last minute and failing to take action against religious schools in Pakistan that were training extremists. “I believe that there would never have been the World Trade Center (attack), the bombing of Afghanistan and the hair-raising tension of a possible nuclear conflict (with India) had it not been for the predominance of the military in the politics of Pakistan,” she said.
Bhutto became the youngest head of state in the world and the first female prime minister of a predominantly Muslim nation when she was elected in 1988 at age 35. Her government was dismissed from office in 1990, but she was re-elected in 1993, running on an anti-corruption campaign. Her platform championed health care, food for the hungry, jobs and a monthly minimum wage. Her second term as prime minister lasted until November 1996, when her government was dismissed by Pakistani President Farooq Leghari after accusations of corruption. She was defeated in a bid for re-election in February 1997.
Bhutto’s husband, Asif Ali Zardari, who served as investment minister in her government, was the target of criticism during her rule. Although never convicted of a crime, Ali Zardari has been jailed more than eight years, accused of taking kickbacks on the government contracts he awarded.
Benazir Bhutto became active in politics after her father, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was ousted in a 1977 military coup and later executed. She has served as leader of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) since 1977, and was co-founder of the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy in 1981. She was arrested numerous times between 1977-1984 by the military regime of General Zia Ul Haq, before being allowed to leave Pakistan in 1984. She has been opposed by Islamic fundamentalists who are suspicious of the PPP and its alleged leftist tendencies. Since 1999, she has lived in exile in London and Dubai and remains an advocate for democracy in Pakistan through her speeches, interviews and writings.
She is the author of two books, “Foreign Policy in Perspective” and her autobiography, “Daughter of Destiny.” Bhutto earned bachelor’s degrees from Harvard University and Oxford University.