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Zardari is an American puppet, who has been in power for four years through the backing of the USA. The USA brought him into power because they thought that they could get the greatest political and security mileage for themselves through his sheer corruption, stupidity and ineptitude. The USA were correct in this analysis.......he is the sort of chap who would sell his own grandmother for the right price; he wanted to sell the military, and its national assets after all.
But a momentum of popular public indignation has built up against Zardari, and hopefully finally in the future there will be action against him....he deserves it.
The article below has nothing new but repeats all the allegations contained in Western newspapers. It also contains popular Western perceptions of Zardari.
However the writer, whilst obviously thoroughly versed in FACTS, leaves out two key items that destabilize Pakistan into a failed state. Zardari has been in "power" if we can describe it that way for a mere 4 years....when he goes the "system" of corruption will still be there.
One questions whether he really exercised power on key state issues.
The epicenter of corruption in Pakistan is the Punjab Pakistan military......and its 200 odd generals and 300 retired generals. The military have ruled Pakistan for most of the country's history, and have acted as back seat drivers when out of power. It is the only country in the world which has guaranteed millionaire generals.......NO OTHER COUNTRY....has such a system of patronage and corruption...not even the super rich USA.
Zardari bhen is a transitory figure, the Punjab Pakistan military are not.
Allied to this epicenter of corruption is USAID......perhaps $80 billion since 1950, at current 2012 prices. This huge amount has been used to buy and train Pakistan's generals.....to the detriment of Pakistan, the struggling Third World nation state.
This simple fact the good writer below failed to mention. BUT it is one of the main causes of corruption in Pakistan.....the destabilizing influence of the USA.
In the future Pakistan somehow has to cut ALL ties with the USA, and cease from receiving any further aid.
Then turn to China.
But I am pessimistic whether the Anglophile elite have the will to turn their back on gora sahib and embrace their giant Asian neighbor. Like good Gunga Dins, the elite of Pakistan will always crave Western approval and advice.
Cricket hero/play boy Imran Khan with his "ex-Jewish wife" directing from the back seat from London will do no better. After all under Jewish law he has two Jewish puter.......and his recreational circle are the jet set Westerners. He also thinks the Punjab Pakistan military is the best thing since sliced bread........and the Taliban are good.
When you have USA infused diarrhea, you SHIT once.......Zardari bhen comes out, maybe fingers crossed in the future...or he is whisked off to safety in UAE, USA, London.
But you have to shit many times more to get the Punjab Pakistan military out ...........of the political/ruling system of Pakistan, along with the JEWSA.
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Cynical politics and massive corruption in Pakistan
by Preeta Memon at Blitz
A self confessed corrupt and 'mentally insane' individual like Asif
Ali Zardari has been surprisingly able in continuing the office of
Pakistan's presidency, despite the proven fact of his involvements in
series of corruptions during the tenure of his wife, Benazir Bhutto –
who had created the ugliest examples of high-profile corruption, thus
stealing public funds worth billions of dollars and shifting the same
into various hidden accounts in the world.
Commenting on Pakistani
politics and high-profile corruption, The Guardian said,
"…The
corruption charges against Zardari date back to the governments of his
late wife, Benazir Bhutto, in the 1990s. Charges against him, the
present prime minister, Yusuf Raza Gillani, and other leading
politicians and former officials were dropped under the National
Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) of 2007: the product of a deal –
allegedly brokered by the Bush administration – between the then
military ruler, President Pervez Musharraf, and Bhutto in late 2007,
which allowed her to return from exile and take part in elections."
"In December 2009, the Supreme Court declared the NRO
unconstitutional. The two years since have seen a slow-motion tug of war
between the supreme court and the government. The main opposition
party, the Pakistan Muslim League of Nawaz Sharif (PMLN), for quite a
while did not push this issue very hard, in part as the result of a
truce between its provincial government in Punjab and the Zardari
government in Islamabad – but also, it is widely thought, because, given
its own record, the PMLN has good reasons to fear judicial activism.
The only leading opposition politician consistently to have backed the
chief justice's campaign has been Imran Khan – and he has never been in
government."
"The truth is that Pakistani politics revolves in large part around
politicians' extraction of resources from the state by means of
corruption, and their distribution to those politicians' followers
through patronage. Radically changing this would mean gutting the
existing Pakistani political system like a fish. Nor is it at all
certain how popular the process would really be with most Pakistanis."
(Pakistan is a failed state....therefore the system is not working......therefore SOMETHING ELSE HAS TO BE TRIED)
The Guardian further said,
"And this is not just a matter of cynical
politics. It also obeys a fundamental moral imperative of local culture
to be loyal to one's followers and, above all, one's kinfolk. The
politician who is really despised is the kleptocrat who both steals
immoderately and does not share the proceeds. As a result, a good deal
of the proceeds of corruption does get distributed through parts of
society, thereby helping to maintain what until recently has been the
surprising underlying stability of the Pakistani political system."
"The military is widely seen as relatively immune to corruption, and
when it comes to its own internal workings, this is largely true –
though it usually ceases to be true when generals go into politics.
However, it is vitally important to note that this is in large part
because for many decades the military as a whole has acted as a kind of
giant patronage network, extracting a huge share of Pakistan's state
resources via the defence budget and other concessions, and spending
them on itself. Because – to its credit – it has distributed the
resulting benefits in an orderly if hierarchical way among its generals,
officers, non-commissioned officers and even to a degree privates, it
has managed to keep a lid on corruption within the military itself.
However, a belief is growing among ordinary soldiers, not just that the
generals' perks are immoderate but that in some cases their families are
using their connections to make huge corrupt fortunes outside the
military."
"As for Zardari, it seems highly doubtful that he can hang on much
longer. The chief justice is pursuing him with bulldog determination and
the letter of the law is on his side. The military has been infuriated
by what it believes are his attempts to ally with Washington against it.
It does not want another military government, but it does want a
civilian regime that is much more responsive to its wishes. And the
opposition want him out before, not after, senate elections that might
just enable him to cling to the presidency even if as expected his
Pakistan People's party is defeated in general elections due by early
2013. Whether getting rid of Zardari will fundamentally change Pakistani
politics, however, is a very different matter."
A major report was published in January 1998 by The New York Times
detailing Zardari's vast corruption and misuse of public funds. The
report discussed US$200 million in kickbacks to Zardari and a Pakistani
partner for a US$4 billion contract with French military contractor
Dassault Aviation, in a deal that fell apart only when the Bhutto
government was dismissed. It contained details of two payments of US$5
million each by a gold bullion dealer in return for a monopoly on gold
imports. It had information from Pakistani investigators that the Bhutto
family had allegedly accrued more than US$1.5 billion in illicit
profits through kickbacks in virtually every sphere of government
activity.
It also reported Zardari's mid-1990s spending spree, which
included hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on jewellery. The
arrangements made by the Bhutto family for their wealth relied on
Western property companies, Western lawyers, and a network of Western
friends. The report described how Zardari had arranged secret contracts,
painstaking negotiations, and the dismissal of anyone who objected to
his dealings.
Citibank, already under fire for its private-banking practices, got
into further trouble as a result of the report. Zardari's financial
history was one case study in a 1999 U.S. Senate report on
vulnerabilities in banking procedures.
In 2005, Daily Pakistan reported he was the second richest man
in Pakistan with an estimated net worth of US$1.8 billion. He amassed
great wealth while his wife was Prime Minister. In 2007, he received
US$60 million in his Swiss bank account through offshore companies under
his name. He was reported to have estates in Surrey, West End of
London, Normandy, Manhattan, and Dubai, as well as a 16th century
chateau in Normandy. In Britain, he used a common legal device—the
purchase of property through nominees with no family link to the
Bhuttos. His homes in Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad are called Bilawal
House I, Bilawal House II, and Zardari House respectively.
He bought a 365-acre (148-hectare) 20-bedroom luxury estate in Rockwood, Surrey in 1995 through a chain of firms, trusts, and offshore companies in 1994. The country home's refurbishment abruptly ended in October 1996, shortly before the end of his wife's second term. He initially denied for eight years that he owned the property and no one paid the bills for the work on the unoccupied mansion. Creditors forced a liquidation sale in 2004 and the Pakistani government claimed the proceeds because the home had been bought with money obtained through corruption. However, he stepped in to claim that he actually was the beneficial owner. As of November 2008
