Jemima: For another Bhutto

London, Jan. 6: Imran Khan’s former wife Jemima has tossed a generous helping of mirchi into the Pakistani cauldron by suggesting that “if Pakistan must be run by a Bhutto, then let it be Fatima”.

It is, however, not clear if she is being entirely serious.

Others, too, have commented that Benazir Bhutto’s 25-year-old niece, Fatima, who is the daughter of her brother Murtaza — he was gunned down in Karachi in 1996 — appears to have the pedigree to turn to politics.

But as Bhutto’s 19-year-old son, Bilawal, prepares to begin his second term at Christ Church, Oxford — he has changed his name from Bilawal Zardari to Bilawal Bhutto Zardari — Jemima has come right out and said Fatima, a poet and journalist, has a better claim to power.

Jemima, not a bad looker herself, observes: “It helps, in a lookist society, that she’s also as beautiful as her aunt — a young Salma Hayek lookalike — and has similar tragic appeal: orphaned, like most Bhuttos, as a result of a political assassination. Fatima is also politicised and outspoken. Too much so. She repeatedly accused her aunt of being complicit in the murder of her father and savagely opposed Zardari. That ruled her out.”

Jemima’s observations on Fatima’s looks are not far off the mark. Fatima has entered the British consciousness only since Bhutto’s assassination when she put aside family differences to attend her aunt’s funeral. Many TV viewers in Britain confessed they were much taken by Fatima’s beauty.

According to Jemima, “the justification for the selection of Benazir’s son as chairman was that only a Bhutto could provide unity within the party. If so, then why not 25-year-old Fatima Bhutto, who is arguably more qualified for the job than her teenage Facebooking cousin?

“If everything’s in a name, Fatima need not have changed hers in order to inherit. Brought up in Pakistan, unlike Bilawal, and a native speaker, she is an established writer and political commentator. At least she has some work experience. Aunt Benazir’s first-ever job was Prime Minister of a 160-million-strong nation.”

Fatima did cause a stir with an article in the Los Angeles Times and an interview on BBC World Service in which she disparaged Bhutto in no uncertain terms before her death.

“The real reason Fatima is my favourite Bhutto, though, is that she has the sense to realise that a few good articles and the right surname don’t qualify her for leadership,” says Jemima in today’s Sunday Telegraph.

“Unlike others in the family, she rejects the notion that political power is her birthright: ‘I don’t think my name qualifies me or makes me the best person’.”

Jemima has admirers both in Britain and abroad, not only for her looks, but also for the spirited manner in which she led the protests outside the Pakistan high commission in London, demanding both the lifting of President Pervez Musharraf’s state of emergency and the release of all political prisoners, including Imran.

But she now accepts that the Benazir’s Pakistan People’s Party may win the forthcoming general election because of the sympathy vote.

“Benazir Bhutto’s 19-year-old son and heir will lead the PPP into the upcoming elections, which his party is likely to win, thanks to the martyr factor,” she acknowledges.

Little by little, Jemima herself is becoming a player on the Pakistani political scene, though from outside the country. She makes a fair point when she draws attention to imprisoned lawyers — neither the British nor the American governments have pressed Musharraf to restore the judges he sacked.

Jemima points out that “Aitzaz Ahsan, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association and PPP stalwart, emerged as a national hero and natural successor when he stood up to the military and protested against the dismissal of the chief justice. For this he was jailed, beaten and kept in solitary confinement. He remains under house arrest in Lahore. And as he has credibility, experience and popular support, it suits all the power seekers, both inside and outside the PPP, that he stays there.”