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Asif Ali Zardari is the current and 11th President of Pakistan and a former co-chairman of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). He was a federal minister in the mid-1990s, as well as a member of the Senate.
Introduction
Zardari became PPP co-chairman after abdicating from the position of party chairperson and nominating his son Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari for the post. The development followed the assassination of his wife, former prime minister and party chief Benazir Bhutto on December 27, 2007. After Benazir’s murder, Zardari began to function as PPP’s de facto chief especially during Bilawal’s time in the United Kingdom. He resigned from the position of the party’s co-chief in March 2013 in view of a case pertaining to simultaneously holding two offices — of president and party chief.
Biography
Zardari was born on July 26, 1955 to a well-known Baloch family from Nawabshah, Sindh. His father, Hakim Ali Zardari, was a former businessman and politician and was chief of the Zardari tribe until his death on May 24, 2011.
Zardari obtained his primary education at the Karachi Grammar School and then moved to Cadet College Petaro for high school. He also briefly attended the St Patrick's High School in Karachi and went to London for higher education. Zardari married Benazir in 1987 in a traditional wedding ceremony.
Apart from his son Bilawal who currently heads PPP, Zardari has two daughters – Bakhtawar and Aseefa.
Zardari’s initiation into politics was not so successful but his career began to take off after his marriage to Benazir. In both her governments, he was made federal minister, first with the portfolio of environment and later with that of investment.
In 1990, he was accused of tying a bomb to a businessman’s leg and sending him into a bank to withdraw cash from his account as a pay-off. The charge was never proved and Zardari was released after spending three years in prison.
Later in 1996, after the sacking of Benazir’s second government, Zardari was arrested and charged with a number of offences, including the murder of his wife's brother, Murtaza Bhutto. He remained in prison for eight years and was released on bail in 2004.
Following his release, Zardari kept a low profile but returned to Pakistan in December 2007 after his wife’s assassination.
A general election was held in the country in February 2008 in which PPP won the most number of national seats and formed a coalition government at the centre with Yousuf Raza Gilani as prime minister.
Months later, in September 2008, he was elected as the country’s president, replacing General (retd) Pervez Musharraf.
As President Zardari’s election as the president was soon followed by the launching of the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP). The scheme has been criticised for being launched in a rush and its cash grant of Rs 1,000 per family as being insufficient for the program’s beneficiaries.
During Zardari’s term, the government initiated the Aghaz-i-Huqooq-i-Balochistan package and managed to forge a consensus for the seventh National Finance Corporation (NFC) award. Moreover, with the approval of the 18th Amendment, Zardari surrendered the president’s power to dissolve Parliament.
In December 2011, Zardari signed two bills seeking stricter punishments for a number of crimes against women into laws. The first bill sought strict punishments for giving women away in marriage under various customs and depriving them of rightful inheritance. Whereas, the second bill sought stern punishments for those involved in acid attacks.
Controversies and allegations Zardari has faced much criticism and has continually been accused of corruption and misconduct among other things. He has also spent several years in prison on different charges.
His reputation for corruption is deeply entrenched in the narrative propagated by a significant section of the national media. When Benazir was prime minister, he was labelled as Mr 10% on account of accusations relating to accepting kickbacks and stealing from the state’s coffers.
Before his wife’s untimely demise, Zardari was kept away from political circles especially during PPP’s campaign for the 2008 election, mostly on account of his negative public image.
The most well-known case against him has been that of receiving kickbacks in relation to a Swiss company. A court convicted Zardari in the case in 1999 but two years later the Supreme Court declared the trial as flawed on account of “political bias”. A retrial was ordered in Pakistan, however in 2003, a Swiss court found both Zardari and Benazir guilty of money laundering and taking bribes in the case.
In 2007, Musharraf promulgated the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO), benefitting Zardari among others. The Supreme Court later declared NRO as never to have existed and against the Constitution creating complications for PPP and Zardari. These did not resolve until only recently when Swiss authorities said the case against the president could not be reopened in Switzerland on “legal grounds”.
Zardari was also the subject of a petition seeking contempt of court proceedings against him for not complying with a Lahore High Court ruling declaring political activities by the president unconstitutional. As a result, he relinquished his post of PPP co-chairman and made Bilawal the party’s patron-in-chief.
