There is something about driving through Karachi’s narrow, bumpy roads in a campaign truck — going into its poorest neighbourhoods, dodging low-hanging cab­les and the unforgiving branches of old banyan trees — that beats flying to jalsas aboard a helicopter or aircraft. At least that’s what PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari thinks.

“I didn’t want to call people to come to me,” he tells Dawn atop his shipping container on wheels as it meanders through Shireen Jinnah Colony, Keamari, Lyari and Malir areas. “I wanted to go to them.”

Men, women and children hung out of windows of small apartment blocks in Keamari to wave to their leader. As the truck went past the Kutiyana Memon Hospital, a woman hooked to a drip joined others on the balcony with her IV stand and danced to the undeniably catchy PPP anthem. There were thousands following his truck, some holding children in one hand and PPP flags in the other.

It was a festival, and Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari was the celebrity.

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