{"id":76737,"date":"2023-04-18T16:21:11","date_gmt":"2023-04-18T16:21:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/?page_id=76737"},"modified":"2023-04-18T16:21:11","modified_gmt":"2023-04-18T16:21:11","slug":"bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wpb-content-wrapper\"><p>[vc_row type=&#8221;container&#8221; css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1680284512306{padding-top: 20px !important;}&#8221;][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\"><strong><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\">Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa<br \/>\n<\/span><\/strong><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"><span style=\"font-size: small;\">by\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><small>Benazir Bhutto<\/small><\/span><\/span><small><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\"><br \/>\nJohannesburg &#8211; August 7, 2001<\/span><\/small><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\"><br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"hr02.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"684\" height=\"4\" border=\"0\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Speaking before the top one hundred women business and political leaders of the Republic of South Africa, Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto compared Pakistan&#8217;s fight for democracy to South Africa&#8217;s Fight against Apartheid.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Bhutto, who flew into Johannesburg yesterday received wide coverage in the South African print and electronic press.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">She received a warm welcome from the professional women at the Women&#8217;s Conference to commemorate Women&#8217;s Week in South Africa. The title of the Conference was Women and Leadership: Against the Odds. She was the key note speaker.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><i><b><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Extracts of the Speech follow:<\/span><\/b><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It is a particular honor for me to be with you this morning at this gathering of women as part of your Nation&#8217;s historic celebration of Women&#8217;s Day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">What makes this more special is that we meet in South Africa. All during the time I was growing up in Pakistan, and going to school in America and England, the words &#8220;South Africa&#8221; were a metaphor for injustice, and terror and inhumanity.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">And then, miraculously, the words &#8220;South Africa&#8221; were transformed into a metaphor for people all over the world who are oppressed. South Africa became a metaphor for hope, for the triumph of justice, and a demonstration that determination and courage can create miracles.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen, if apartheid can crumble in South Africa, racism, sexism and bigotry can crumble in every corner of this planet.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I stand here with you truly in the epicenter of world freedom. Yet the world still is complex; a world that defies simple explanations and simple solutions; a world that is still very much in transition from one set of political realities to another.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The world is less the simple place than we had dreamed it would be in the late eighties, with communism disintegrating and democracy taking root all over Eastern Europe, Southeast and Southwest Asia, and Africa.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">In those days, the World talked about how to spend the anticipated on domestic needs and international responsibilities. And in Pakistan, we were finally coming to grips with restoring democracy and economic reform after a decade of bitter, brutal Martial law.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">But, the forces of dictatorship did not relinquish their iron grip of my country so easily. Today, I travel to South Africa to speak with you at a difficult time for me, and my country. And in light of your bitter history of political repression, I would hope that you would open your hearts to the suffering of my people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">This is a time of crisis and tragedy in Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">History has sadly come full circle on the subcontinent.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">A military regime once again rules my homeland with an iron fist. The last vestiges of democratic institutions are being assaulted and dismantled.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">No Parliament. No state assemblies. No independent judiciary. No human rights. No free press. No independent labor organizations. Heavily controlled and regulated NGOs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Women are being thrown back into another era, into another century of repression and exploitation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We witness a tragic rise in exploitation of religion for political purposes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">A stalemate between India and Pakistan in Kashmir.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">An unsuccessful summit between the two nuclear-armed nations of South Asia only last month collapsing in shambles.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It is not a pretty picture. It is a dangerous picture.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">This is Pakistan in the year 2001.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The disintegration of democracy in Pakistan did not come overnight, and it did not come in one military coup. Since my government was overthrown four years back Pakistan has drifted rudderless in a sea of conflict and violence &#8212; an agenda of vengeance and a hijacking of democracy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The heirs to the dictator General Zia ul Haq who terrorized Pakistan with an iron fist for a decade, were resurrected with new names and new methods.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">My successor elected in a military backed fraudulent election imposed a one party dictatorship on Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I was the first victim. And then my party. And then the constituencies across the breadth of my country that supported the agenda of democratic and economic reform.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">And then the Prime Minister attempted to topple the one institution that brought him to power and that could defend itself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">His attempt to topple the Army failed. But now we all pay the price.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The military stepped in to restore order and democracy in our Nation. It succeeded in neither. And the last pretenses of democracy and democratic institutions have evaporated.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">To tighten their grip on political opposition, the President of our country was toppled. The power of the courts was usurped. Judges were sacked. Journalists were assaulted. Censorship was imposed. The rights of women were thrown back a generation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Just as in South Africa during the terror of apartheid, supporters of democracy and human rights were forced into exile once again.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I know it has become the fashion both in the developed and developing world over the last decade, to destroy leaders&#8217; reputations by innuendo, allegation and rumour. This strategy now even has a name &#8212; the politics of personal destruction.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">This is true not just in Pakistan, but even in the most developed democracies.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">But the scale to which this was orchestrated in Pakistan against my party defied anything seen in the world. It was a relentless, devastating and overt assault on justice in an attempt to eliminate my leadership and to destroy me personally.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Bureaucrats, businessmen and cabinet members were arrested and tortured to perjure themselves to fabricate false charges. I was truly blessed that they remained strong and would not be tortured and threatened into betraying me. But their failure to coerce witnesses didn&#8217;t stop my successors from proceeding.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I was pressured and humiliated in increasingly desperate attempts to force me to quit politics.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">My own husband was accused of even more ridiculous and scurrilous charges, including, the unspeakable slanders of murdering my own brother and trafficking in drugs. And his father was arrested to pressure him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">My husband and father-in-law are still behind bars, hostages to my political career.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The full extent of the plot against me was revealed through the extraordinary release of bugged conversations, proving beyond doubt that the charges against me were contrived.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I used to think, naively, that an election alone could change things for the better. Now I realize that a country needs more than democratic elections, it needs the rule of law.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">An election can bring in a new Parliament and a new government.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It cannot, however, bring in a new bureaucracy or intelligence system.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It cannot, without an independent judiciary, lift the veil on the Machiavellian intrigues that take place that are both brutal and barbaric and undermine civil society.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It cannot give acknowledgment, without fair hearing, to the victims of tyranny &#8212; those who lost their lives, then livelihoods, their families, their peace of mind, who were tortured, imprisoned or forced to flee to foreign lands for refusing to commit perjury and destroy the path of justice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Does it sound familiar, ladies and gentlemen? South Africa of the seventies. Pakistan today.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The suffering is not of one person, not of one family, not of one political party, but of an entire nation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen, an edifice built without law collapses, just as a skyscraper built without a foundation will ultimately crumble.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Pakistan is in turmoil and with it the stability in the region is threatened.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Issues of poverty, gender equality and minority rights are calling for attention, as are the issues of unemployment and inflation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">As the military junta rules, religious fundamentalists take up more political space at the cost of political forces. Pakistan could be threatened with an Islamic revolution. But this revolution would be nuclear armed. The &#8220;Talibanization&#8221; of Pakistan can literally threaten world peace.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen, the story of Pakistan did not have to turn out this way, and I am convinced that ultimately things will be very different.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The democratic government I led did its best to create a new, modern Pakistan. With the mandate and support of the people we marketed the country as a crossroads to the Gulf, Central and South Asia.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We advanced our country as a model of Islamic moderation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We committed ourselves to education, with special programs targeted to female illiteracy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We committed ourselves to immunization and children&#8217;s health. We committed ourselves to family planning and population control.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We transformed the country into a center for financial and commercial investment, creating jobs and wealth. We created the physical infrastructure, the roads, the electricity, and the power plants, to sustain a modern, developed economy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">After my overthrow and charges of corruption, the international community stepped back and foreign investment in Pakistan dried up. . Businessmen clearly prefer stable economies and stable markets, in countries governed by the rule of law, where contracts are honored and commitments fulfilled.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The absence of law also intimidated domestic investment as well. Martial law and economic development are mutually exclusive, they cannot exist together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The dignity of our financial system is correlated with the destruction of legitimate political institutions, proving once again, just like the international divestiture movement against South Africa under apartheid, democracy and economic development must proceed simultaneously.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It is such times that test the mettle of real leadership. Ironically, but repeatedly, history tells us that the best of leadership is constructed in the worst of times.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I welcome the Commonwealth&#8217;s and the international support for democracy in Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Under that pressure, the Generals recently permitted local elections. My party supporters emerged as the single largest winners even though they fought without me on the ground and without the party symbol on the ballot. We proved against all odds that democracy is irrepressible, that ultimately the people will prevail.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The question before my nation is how many will suffer imprisonment, deprivation, discrimination, poverty and even death before justice and the forces of history restore the democratic order.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">And although I know not the answer to that question, I know it is my obligation to lead this battle once again, no matter what the personal price, to restore a democratic Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It is not necessarily the life I would have chosen for myself. But it seems to be the life that chose me. And in the words of President John Kennedy, &#8220;I do not shrink from this responsibility, I welcome it.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">For leadership is born of a passion, and it is a commitment. A commitment to an idea, to a people, to a land. I travel, never knowing when I will be able to see my husband. He has been in prison for the fifth year running, a hostage of my political career.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I travel and miss my children. They are all under thirteen. It is difficult explaining to little children why their mother can&#8217;t be with them, why their father is a political prisoner.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I am reconciled to the fact that the needs of my 140 million people come first, and will always come first.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">For those in the feminist movement who say that woman can have it all simultaneously, I urge they look at my life. Women can have it all but Women have to make difficult choices, often choices that men are not forced to make. And we must live with the consequences, for better or worse.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It is not always easy. But we do it for all the woman who came before us who gave us this opportunity. And most of all, we do it for all woman who will come after us &#8212; the baby girls yet unborn!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen, to succeed as a political leader, one must be on call all the time, like an Emergency Room doctor, but unlike a doctor, without a moment&#8217;s break. On call for good news and bad. On call to respond quickly, to think quickly to move quickly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I was brought up in a political family. In a way, I was groomed for politics. Yet, a political role was not one that I actively sought. It came to me through an accident of fate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I had just completed my education and returned to Pakistan in 1977 when the tanks rumbled up the road in Rawalpindi and troops took over the Prime Minister&#8217;s House. My younger siblings had to go back to their studies.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I stayed behind and was pulled into the political campaign by the arrest of senior party leaders. That put an end to my career goal to join the Foreign Service in Pakistan and become High Commissioner to England or Ambassador to the US, the two countries I had studied in and knew well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Fate took over my life and my destiny was no longer in my hands.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Thus, some are born to leadership, whilst others have leadership thrust upon them. Many women leaders, particularly in South Asia, have been thrown into political waters. The assassin&#8217;s bullet, the sound of boots or tragedy has thrust them into a role they might otherwise not have chosen. Yet they are more than extensions of the male members of their families.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Each woman leader has had to win her badge of courage and recognition.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">As a child of my age, in the late sixties, I was influenced by the social ferment around me. The worldwide students movement, from Rawalpindi, to France, to Washington, were important factors in my youth. The fight against apartheid shaped the ferocity of my commitment to stand up for principle. Kate Millet and the burgeoning movement for women&#8217;s race empowered me and emboldened me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">As an Asian at Harvard, I bitterly resented the war in Vietnam and joined up with American students to protest a war that they thought was unjust and did not want to fight.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It was also the time of the impeachment against President Nixon. A time of moral reawakening, as Martin Luther King spoke passionately about justice and injustice in America and in South Africa.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">These important steps helped shape my outlook on life, helped me focus on fighting injustice, promoting freedom and safeguarding the rights of the weak and dispossessed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">But above all, in America during the Vietnam War I saw the awesome power of the people changing policies, changing leaders, and changing history.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">From Harvard I went to Oxford.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">While I was at Oxford, the Conservative party chose a woman, Margaret Thatcher, as the Leader of Opposition.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">At Oxford, I was the first female foreigner to be elected as President of the Oxford Union. It was there that I learned to debate, slowly gaining confidence before an audience.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">As the Prime Minister of Pakistan I appeared before an historic Joint Session of the United States Congress in 1989. In that address, the most meaningful line to me was my simple message to the woman of America, my message to the women of the world. Three simple, powerful words: YES YOU CAN!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Don&#8217;t accept the status quo. Don&#8217;t accept no for an answer. Don&#8217;t accept traditional roles and traditional constraints. And don&#8217;t think that leadership and being female are contradictory.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">My victory was a victory for women everywhere. It broke the mind cast of the past.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I was the first woman ever elected head of government in the Muslim world. Now four others, two in Bangladesh, one in Turkey and in Indonesia, have followed in my path. One more glass ceiling is shattered. But thousands are left to break.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The day is not far off when women will join even the Armed Forces of Pakistan, an idea that I discussed with my service chiefs in my last tenure. They already began the journey of joining the judiciary in my last term. The appointment of women judges is something I am very proud of, as well as the creation of a Women&#8217;s Development Bank to make small loans to women entrepreneurs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">And as women enter the work force, it becomes more sensitive too, to the needs of women and the difficulties in their lives.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Your record on human, political and economic rights for woman in South Africa should inspire women all around the world to keep on pressing, keep on fighting, keep on working for the rights of equality that cannot forever be denied.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I have attempted, throughout my career, to combine the best of different experiences.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">To build for my people a modern world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">By heralding in the information revolution, introducing fax machines, digital pagers, optic fiber, cellular telephones, satellite dishes, Internet, the e-mail and even CNN into Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Under my leadership of de-regulation Pakistan integrated into the global economy becoming one of the ten emerging capital markets of the world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The International Labor Organization&#8217;s data showed that the largest job generation in Pakistani history took place in the PPP government.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The World Bank called our energy program a model to the entire developing world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">The President of the World Health Organization gave me a gold medal in recognition of our efforts to improve the health of our children by eliminating polio and reducing infant mortality.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We increased literacy rates by one third and secured women&#8217;s rights by signing the Convention for the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women in Beijing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We brought down the population growth rate whilst we took up the economic growth rate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">It was a remarkable transformation of a society for our downtrodden and under privliged people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">That is my legacy to the people of Pakistan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We believed in education, and we believed in markets.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We believed in opportunity and we believed in foreign investment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We believed in giving our people hope in a better future.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Ladies and gentlemen,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Despite the travails of the last four years, I am not bitter.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">In my father&#8217;s last letter to me before he was murdered by one of Pakistan&#8217;s many military tyrants, he quoted Tennyson: &#8220;Ah, what shall I be at fifty if I find the world so bitter at 25.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">He had then turned fifty and I twenty five.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">He asked me never to be bitter. I have honored my father&#8217;s dying wish.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">I look at South Africa today and tears come to my eyes. My faith in humanity and my faith in God are strengthened by the miracle that has happened here. You &#8212; the people of South Africa &#8211; inspire and empower all of the oppressed, all over the world. My nation and I remain optimistic about the future, knowing in our hearts that time, justice and the forces of history are on our side.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">Thank you ladies and gentlemen.<\/span>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[vc_row type=&#8221;container&#8221; css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1680284512306{padding-top: 20px !important;}&#8221;][vc_column][vc_column_text] Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa by\u00a0Benazir Bhutto Johannesburg &#8211; August 7, 2001 Speaking before the top one hundred women business and political leaders of the Republic of South Africa, Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto compared Pakistan&#8217;s fight for democracy to South Africa&#8217;s Fight [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-full-width.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-76737","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa - Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa - Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[vc_row type=&#8221;container&#8221; css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1680284512306{padding-top: 20px !important;}&#8221;][vc_column][vc_column_text] Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa by\u00a0Benazir Bhutto Johannesburg &#8211; August 7, 2001 Speaking before the top one hundred women business and political leaders of the Republic of South Africa, Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto compared Pakistan&#8217;s fight for democracy to South Africa&#8217;s Fight [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"40 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/\",\"name\":\"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa - Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-04-18T16:21:11+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/\",\"name\":\"Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians\",\"description\":\"Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa - Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/pppp.org.pk\/website\/bhutto-compares-fight-for-pakistani-democracy-to-fight-against-apartheid-in-south-africa\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Bhutto Compares Fight for Pakistani Democracy to Fight Against Apartheid in South Africa - Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians","og_description":"[vc_row type=&#8221;container&#8221; 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