Daughter Of The East: An Autobiography by Benazir Bhutto

Author:Benazir Bhutto [Bhutto, Benazir]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781471138133
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

10

TWO MORE YEARS ALONE IN SUB-JAIL

Familiarity. Comfort. Home. Leaving aside the fact that the paramilitary Frontier Forces were once more posted inside the compound walls and a prison staff came daily to Al-Murtaza to supervise my detention, I revelled in my apparent good fortune. Some members of the household staff would be permitted to enter Al-Murtaza during the day, the Martial Law authorities told me. I could use the telephone and, best of all, receive three visitors a fortnight. After almost ten months of solitary confinement, these privileges sounded tantamount to a stay in a five-star hotel. I celebrated my first night home by taking a long, hot bath and manicuring my nails.

But I had celebrated too soon. My telephone calls were restricted to conversations with my relatives and I was not allowed to talk about political matters. The telephone rarely worked. Often my calls were disconnected or the line simply went dead. Later I found out why. All the phone lines were run through a military communications outpost set up outside the walls.

In the year that the regime kept me locked up at Al-Murtaza, the promise of three visitors a fortnight soon became a myth as well. Only my mother, Sanam, and my Auntie Manna were on my allowed list. Each lived in Karachi, over an hour away by air, a journey made more difficult by the infrequent and inconveniently timed flights to interior Sindh. Sanam, who now had a house and a husband to look after, came only once or twice. My mother, who was in poor health, was only able to visit infrequently. I had political acquaintances in Larkana who could have visited me easily, but the jail authorities did not allow substitutions. Essentially, I was back in solitary confinement. When I did have a visitor, more often than not a jail official, my jaws ached afterwards from the unaccustomed exercise. I probably should have talked to myself in the endless silence if for no other reason than to hear a human voice, but I didn’t think of it.

New detention orders, however, came regularly every three months. I knew the words now, by heart. ‘Whereas the Deputy Martial Law Administrator is of the opinion that for the purpose of preventing Miss Benazir Bhutto from acting in a manner prejudicial to the purpose for which Martial Law has been proclaimed, or to the security of Pakistan, the public safety or interest, or the efficient conduct of Martial Law, it is necessary to detain the said Miss Benazir Bhutto . ’

Time weighed more heavily than ever. There were no afternoon papers to read, no International Herald Tribune. There was little on television apart from Arabic language study programmes, Zia’s news in Sindhi, Urdu and English, brainwashing documentaries about the regime’s political activities, and a few half-hour plays. I succumbed to periods of self-pity followed by attacks of remorse. You shouldn’t be ungrateful to God, I chided myself. You have your home. You have food and clothing. Think of all those less fortunate.

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