What has Benazir Bhutto come back as? The welcoming throngs, their touching faith in her, the general air of festive anticipation are all misleading. In a few days, when the enthusiasm — in part born out of the sad desperation political Pakistan finds itself in — runs out, what is clear now logically may become evident at a popular level. Benazir has come back to Pakistan with her credibility in shreds. Never mind all the realpolitik punditry about giving Pakistan a stable arrangement, about the Washington consensus forged between Benazir and the Army, about the need for a smooth transition. Pakistan wants and deserves real democracy. And Benazir is just about the last politician who can give this yearning any shape.Any comparison with her 1985 homecoming is fatuous. That time she came in defiance of a dictator. This time she come back in cahoots with a dictator. That time, she symbolised the promise of genuine change. This time she is part of a package deal that some people at the top want to offer to the people of Pakistan and tell them to be satisfied with it. Part of that deal is that Nawaz Sharif, the other big political leader, should stay out of the country. What was done with Sharif is a scandal and no politician can be a party to it and say he or she wants democracy. In sporting terms familiar to everyone in the subcontinent, the Benazir homecoming is not only not the final in Pakistani politics, it is not even the semi-final, or even a first division match. This kind of politics is a second division outing.Let’s not get governance records into this argument. Neither Sharif nor Benazir governed Pakistan with much distinction. It is Pakistan’s terrible misfortune that a fresh-faced and powerful change-minded politician isn’t around. But in politics, you have to do with what you have, as we realise in Indian democracy frequently. Pakistan should have been able to choose between what it has — Benazir and Sharif. One of them has been summarily removed from the equation and the other is complicit in that decision. Benazir has come home bearing the worst possible gift for her fellow citizens.
