Pakistan: Bhutto's Legacy Today

Bhutto’s legacy is relevant today in Pakistani politics mainly because what the oppressed masses in general see to the left of the rightwing parties and obscurantist outfits is the PPP.

Whilst the masses are being ground down under the excruciating weight of the crisis of Pakistani capitalism, the politics of the PPP revolves around many commemorations of the births and deaths of its leaders. December 27 marked the death anniversary of Benazir Bhutto. On January 5 was the birth anniversary of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto.

Benazir Bhutto’s son Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari was launched as the new leader of the PPP at his mother’s anniversary gathering at the ancestral tombs of the Bhutto family. The pretence of the present hierarchy at the helm of the PPP is that they are treading on the path of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s legacy. However, when they are questioned about abandoning the revolutionary socialist programme of Bhutto on which the PPP was founded in 1967, their abrupt answer, if at all they reply to the essence of the question, is that times and situations have changed. This is the justification given for Ms Bhutto’s compromises with the state and imperialism, and the capitulation of the party to capitalism since the party was brought back to power in 1988 after General Ziaul Haq’s plane crash and fear of an impending revolt from below.

The party’s socialist programme had been adopted in a situation when after a decade of the despotic rule of General Ayub Khan, where there had been rapid industrialisation, high growth rates and significant expansion of the social and physical infrastructure, paradoxically had ended up in a mass revolt. The main reason for this growth and industrialisation was the spin-off effects of the boom of western capitalism. But instead of resolving the crisis, this Keynesian economic model sharpened contradictions within society that exploded with a mass volcanic eruption.

Bhutto and several other leftist activists who were fed up with the policies of class collaboration with the ‘national’ bourgeoisie by the incumbent left leaders had ended up with the proclamation of the socialist revolution rather than a democratic one asserted by the traditional left parties. It was this programme that went beyond the basic bourgeois democratic demands that made the meteoric rise of the PPP possible and Bhutto evolved as a living legend whose legacy as a left tradition of the masses still lingers on. However, that was not an isolated development confined to Pakistan. The phenomenon was witnessed in several other neo-colonial countries in the 1950s and 1960s where the communist parties and the established left leadership failed to come up to the revolutionary aspirations of the mass movements in backward countries, and the consequential vacuum of leadership was then filled by individuals and groups. These came up with socialist slogans and programmes transcending the existent economic systems, states and society. It is another thing that these populist leaders had neither the parties with cadre networks nor the strategy and ideological depth to carry out a socialist revolution. We witnessed such populist processes with Peron in Argentina, Patrice Lumumba in Congo, Seokarno in Indonesia, Salvador Allende in Chile and many others in several other countries. However, the mass upheavals rallying around these leaders and parties and, more importantly, the subsequent brutal oppression carried out by the state created political traditions that have transcended generations of the toiling classes.

These movements are still dominating the political spectrum in most of these countries. The other important factor is that being culturally primitive in some aspects, these movements became personalised to a large extent. Hence, the transition of these parties into dynastic hierarchies was almost inevitable. Bhutto’s legacy is relevant today in Pakistani politics mainly because the oppressed masses in general, when they look at the political horizon in Pakistan, what they see on the left of the rightwing parties and obscurantist outfits is the PPP. Hence, when they enter into the arena of class struggle, elections or any political activity, they rally around the banner of the PPP.

But the PPP and other such hierarchical and populist parties are not the same as the traditional social democratic and communist parties of the advanced capitalist countries, as they have no real party structures, are devoid of internal democracy, and the leaders at different levels are nominated by the top leadership in a whimsical manner. Hence, they are not truly political parties in the classical sense. In fact, there are two PPPs. One is an openly bourgeois party with nominated officials and structures that can be used by the state and the ruling classes to quell mass movements in a period of actual or impending explosion of the class struggle. The other is the PPP that is in the consciousness of the downtrodden working classes who are burdened by the policies of this tradition and have no other alternative on a mass scale that they could seriously consider for coming to power and resolving their burning problems. At the same time, the PPP is a symbol of unity for the toilers and when they embark upon a movement, they have a collective platform and an avenue to converge in unity.

The arguments of apologists of the compromised leadership, especially those who give it a left cover, are pathetic. To say that socialism is not needed with the change of the conditions is to add insult to the injury of the masses that are being devastated by this capitalism in decay. Yes, the conditions have changed but in what direction? As compared to the 1960s, the poverty, misery and deprivation of the vast majority of the population has worsened. If anything, the argument should go in the opposite direction. With the deep crisis of the economy, state and society, and the vexing conditions of the masses, socialism is much more necessary today than it was four decades ago. It is precisely because of the failure of the first PPP government to abolish capitalism that it was overthrown. Even the most radical reforms with the existence of capitalist relations could not and cannot alleviate the misery and poverty of the masses. The lesson of the fall of Bhutto and the assassinations of the subsequent leaders shows that the half-hearted and ‘multiclass’ policies can only end up in tragedy and ruin. In Bhutto’s last testament, he wrote, “The class struggle is irreconcilable and it must end in the victory of one class over the other.” That is the real legacy of Bhutto and the lesson of his life and death. Successive PPP leaderships have consciously failed to understand this legacy. The masses are learning it fast and in time will draw correct conclusions and vote with their feet.