Fatima slams Bilawal146;s appointment as PPP head

8220;It8217;s become in a sense the family business, like an antique shop, where it8217;s just 8216;So and So and Sons8217; and then grandsons and great grandsons. It just gets handed down,8221; she said in an interview to The Times published on Saturday.

8220;The idea that it has to be a Bhutto, I think, is a dangerous one. It doesn8217;t benefit Pakistan. It doesn8217;t benefit a party that8217;s supposed to be run on democratic lines and it doesn8217;t benefit us as citizens if we think only about personalities and not about platforms.8221;

At a press conference in London earlier this week, Bilawal had denied that the party had been handed to him 8220;like some piece of family furniture.8221;

Fatima8217;s father Murtaza Bhutto had died in Karachi under mysterious circumstances 12 years ago when Benazir was Prime Minister. Since then, she and her mother had been locked in a feud with Benazir, but joined in the mourning after the assassination of the opposition leader. 8220;It was not a pleasant relationship we had at all,8221; Fatima, also a newspaper columnist, said.

Fatima also rejected her own claim to the Bhutto legacy, saying that neither she nor her 17-year-old brother were the rightful heirs to lead the Pakistan People8217;s Party PPP. 8220;Ultimately the party workers believe that nobody can head the party but a Bhutto, but I don8217;t think the workers believe that on whomever you put the Bhutto name can lead,8221; she said.