I was lucky enough to have met with Benazir Bhutto when she was a guest at a White House Project event nearly ten years ago. Commanding and quick-witted, Bhutto spoke movingly about women’s leadership and its integral importance to democracy. The next and last time I would see her would be at this year’s Council on Foreign Policy lunch in New York shortly before she was to return to Pakistan. I was impressed with her statements on democracy, yet what struck me most was her answer to the question “What would you have done differently during your term as Prime Minister?” Bhutto’s insightful response was that she wished she hadn’t felt the need to appear tougher to compensate for being female – a persistent issue for women who run for and hold office.
I talked with Bhutto for a few minutes afterwards, and have trailed her return to ostensibly share power with Musharraf, and when that fell thru, to stay and participate in the electoral process. But during the last several weeks of violence in Pakistan, the thought that I have had most frequently is that she came home willing to die. It was hard to imagine that it would end any other way.
Bhutto’s murder will be widely covered in the days to come. Yet there are women throughout the world who are not well known like Bhutto – women who also care so deeply about how their country is governed that they risk being raped, disappeared or murdered when they run for office. Just last week, Margaret Wanjiru – a parliamentary candidate in Kenya’s general elections – was reportedly attacked while campaigning in the capital. And there are women like Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the president of Liberia, who once elected, lead under conditions that expose them daily to the danger of being assassinated.
Women in the United States are not usually subjected to such extreme forms of violence and intimidation when they enter the political fray. Yet there are many women in this country who dare not run for office for fear of rough treatment in the press, or because politics is such a “dirty” business. A threatening prospect, perhaps, to many women. But it won’t kill you. Benazir Bhutto may have been a contentious political figure, but she was a pioneer in women’s leadership, paving the way for women to lead on the global stage. And if more women led, and more voices and options were on the table, as we say at The White House Project, it could “change everything.”
I am continually amazed and impressed with the strength of women who step out of the crowd and put themselves forward as leaders, knowing not only the emotional stress but actual physical danger they will be facing. How can we not support them?
We must work to create a more fertile ground for women leaders everywhere so that ultimately women’s leadership is so normal and accepted, it is not given a second thought. I believe that, in many parts of the world, the time is ripe to push for action toward women’s parity in politics, business, corporate boardrooms, and other venues. I believe that more influence by women will rebalance the way power is used, and will bring a longer range and more all encompassing view to decision-making. I believe the world will be better off with more women in leadership roles.
Numbers do count. We need more women moving into the pipelines and into leadership positions. We need more work like that of the White House Project and other organizations who focus on preparing women for these roles. As you say, “Benazir Butto many have been a contentious political figure, but she was a pioneer…” and we should celebrate her and Margaret Wanjiru and all the other women who step out of the crowd and make their voices heard.
Thanks for sharing this. It’s important to be reminded just how much women around the world sacrifice to “change everything.” I hope this will motivate more women to come out and vote.
I am deeply distressed with this assassination on Ms. Bhutto. I have not been able to get clear of this all day – the terrible danger she faced, and all of the tragedy she endured to lead. Truly, what an amazing woman. They may have taken her life, but they have underestimated her legacy or what a catalyst this will be – and can be. We are SO fortunate in the US – yes, we have problems, but not like other parts of the country. Women here CAN speak out – and need to – now. We need to support both those women who lead and the men who also support women leaders (they do exist).
The best we can do tonight is to pray for her children and husband and resolve that we will not let her leadership to be in vain.
Your strong words that she “Came home willing to die”…struck a poignant chord that resonates with the realism that so many global leaders and passionistas face by making their voices heard. You’re quite right making parallels to Margaret Wanjiru, and I’d add, activists like Betty Makoni in Zimbabwe giving a voice to youth by shining a media spotlight on the violent, horrific abuse of tiny girls…
As Anne Morrow Lindbergh once said, “If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness, and a willingness to remain vulnerable.”
Benazir Bhutto ‘remained vulnerable’, and in doing so, lost her life…but she’ll continue to lead women in shaping the future of our globe by the boldness of that vulnerability and transparency, courageous actions in themselves…
Condolences to my dear Global Women’s Leadership Network friends in Pakistan, and to all of us concerned with justice, peace, and ‘marketing hope’ to the rest of the world…
I feel so deeply sad that such a brave and courageous woman would lose her life at a time when she really was making a difference and when she was displaying the will to address the terrible problems of Pakistan and stand up for some sort of democratic process. What a terrible loss to Pakistan and the world! It is hard to grasp what it must be like to think every day that you might be killed because you are willing to fight for what you believe in. I am running for a state representative seat in Denver and the thought never crosses my mind that I might be killed just because I am running for office. My home address is on the literature; I don’t worry about it. If I thought I would be killed, I don’t know if I would do it. I have kids and I wouldn’t want them to lose their mother that way. It really takes courage and commitment to do what she did. It is a sad day for the world.
Please try to get Wolf Blitzer’s CNN interview with Bhutto on Sept. 26, 2007 aired as often as possible this week in Iowa to counter the biblical streak there that a woma’s place is not to lead and have power. The comparison of that view with Bhutto’s comment that Taliban and Al Quaeda do not want a woman in power either make the opinion that women should not be leaders look especially backward.
This is a tragic blow to Pakistan, democracy, leadership, freedom, and all of the achievements women have worked so hard to earn. Bhutto will be greatly missed. I hope that Pakistan’s loss, grief and frustration will not spiral into an avalanche of violence but instead will aid many in turning their understandable rage into greater organization and mobilization. Change is always on the horizon; sometimes it takes a tragedy to push it forward. I can only hope that the best may come from the martyrdom of Benazir Bhutto. She will not be forgotten.
We can say that women here are “not usually subjected to such extreme forms of violence and intimidation when they enter the political fray,” however does it worry anybody else as much as it worries me when people, especially men, are frighteningly vocal and upfront about “hating” Hillary Clinton?
Is it too early yet for the women of the world to unite?
The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is shocking and profoundly sad. It also has, I hope, the potential to be an extraordinary and not-to-be missed opportunity to unite the women of the world in global protest and solidarity. One of our sisters has been assassinated. Nonviolence activists–from courageous suffragists like Alice Paul to great practitioners of nonviolent protest like Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.,–recognized the potential of skillful use of media and events to give their causes profile and power.
In my view, women of the world need to protest this violence in some concrete way.
We need to protest any notion that women are not suitable to govern. We need to make a statement that “the times, they are a changing.” That women are on the move and are united across all sorts of borders. Benazir Bhutto may not have been perfect….who of us is,…but she had the right to run for high office and a right to live.
We have so many women’s groups around the globe. Is it possible that The White House Project could help organize some coordinated effort? I don’t presume to suggest how you might organize such a thing. Certainly the women of the “Nobel Women’s Initiative” and the participants of the recently completed “International Women Leaders Global Security Summit” that The White House Project helped to present are women of status equal to Bhutto, sisters perhaps best in position to understand the danger she faced down, and which has cut her down. Might it not be possible by combining the experience and resources of these high status organizations that you COULD make something significant happen.
Let’s say a protest that rotates around the world like a New Year’s Eve celebration or a Live Aide effort, with women and men of good will asked to do something nonviolent and attention gathering on the same day. Perhaps the event could take place on Wednesday one week or two weeks or a month to the day of this despicable act.
Maybe they would refuse to buy or sell anything that day and send an e-mail to their local newspaper and to the Pakistani consulate or to the UN to that effect. Maybe they send a small donation (the equivalent of a US dollar or less–whatever they can) to a central website. The site could have a thermometer or real-time graph to show how much has been received and how many donors. The donation could be used to set up an education fund for Pakistani girls. Or to begin a global hall of martyrs for women who attempt to enter government or participate in the media in their country. Something to announce that women of the world want an end to violence and are joining together to begin the process of real change.
Maybe some effort less grand than a global effort is more realistic. Certainly success is important in any campaign to unite people. No effort at all would be better than a feeble one that fails. We need to be savvy users of the media. But the thing is, we are all pulling separately most of the time. Isn’t this perhaps a perfect opportunity to pull together…from the grass roots up. Something to make a powerful statement that “the women of the world have had it with violence.”
With anticipation and hope that women will put this tragedy to good use,
Benazir Bhutto was as brave as any man. She died because she was a woman seeking political power in a country that disrespects powerful women. Such a climate of disrespect exists in America as well as shown by the November 2007 campaign meeting in South Carolina (supposedly a civilized place unlike Pakistan) where a woman of patrician bearing asked Arizona Sen. John McCain, “How do we beat the bitch?” He responded by laughing along with the rest of the crowd. “That’s an excellent question,” said McCain after regaining his stride. Then he proceeded to explain why he could indeed beat Hillary Clinton. Although he did not urge violence, his failure to reprimand the questioner for the lack of civility showed his feelings towards women: It’s okay to have the brilliant ones called bitches. The respect paid to the question by Senator McCain shows the utter disrespect he has for women in power.
Does any American woman seriously believe that Pakistan’s president Pervez Musharraf would have laughed at being asked a question labeling Ms Bhutto a bitch?
Benazir Bhutto stepped into a moment of history in her country, where gender was not so much the issue, but what she represented to the status quo.
This murder would have happened to a man with this courage and this conviction and this willingness to persue Democracy.
That she was a woman goes to show us that no one is immune from the forces of extremism, fanaticism and evil.
If politics as a form of government change is regarded as “dirty”, the cleansing will come from moral as well as philosophical covictions. And women at this point have a better grasp what this means.
Audre Lourde said it well: “You cannot use the master’s tools to take down the master’s house.”
We need our own tools…those not fashioned and formed by men. And then the White House we build will be a White House for everyone…
I have been examining this question of women running for office in a way that only women can run for office, for 12 years at the Women’s Campaign School at Yale University and most recently through First Woman President.org, a blog that also examines how we will get her there.
Keep up your wonderful work. Marie, it’s all coming together!
This is very tragic. In this country we must also be mindful of how far women and society still need to go. The ERA (equal rights amendment) has still not been ratified. While most think that women have come a long way and don’t need it, this ERA reaches much farther than womens rights. The ERA would not allow ANY discrimination based on social economic strata, age, gender, race, religion. The reason this is being stopped is because insurance companies, institutions, corporations, etc., do not want to treat everyone the same – they want it status quo. We must continue fighting for this amendment to be added to the US constitution.
Many members of the League of Women Voters, NOW and University womens association have been still trying to push this through – many of them were members of the original fight in the 60s and 70s. We will have a long way to go here and we can’t stop now!
This is so painful to me. i am trying to accept this and its hurting me. She was the the one bright spot for change in Pakistan and now she is gone. I hope she will never be forgotten and that her story will be talked about more now. This world needs more women like her. I hope this doesn’t discourage women from becoming involved in government. Hopefully it will encourage them. Just think, the more women that enter government, the better off all of us will be. It cannot come fast enough. I will continue to donate what I can and keep praying for more and more empowerment of all women.
The Bhutto assassination shows how far women have not come within the structure and framework of democracy, and indeed, how very pagan our world continues to be, regardless of governmental philosophy.
It is a very short jump to conclude that for women, political participation is difficult, if not impossible, given the nature of male politics and its adherence to violence, aided by the fact that female intimidation is easily accomplished and trivialized.
If the Bhutto murder shows anything it shows the increasing need for women to be everywhere in the streets of both Islamic and Christian democracies to help and prevent the street brawls which result in so much needless violence justified by the fact that there is little to prevent men from violent conflict except the presence of women – which, hopefully, they would respect, and that hopefully, women would demand. Where politics justifies the killing of women and children, there is no government worth defending, and all is lost to violence, dictatorship, and militant rules of men. What can prevent that future but women in politics?
Most assuredly Bhutto knew that, and sadly fought for that legacy, now ended so abruptly by the very forces she was trying to combat. Without changes, all people will be reduced to cave dwellers, afraid of their own shadows in such an atmosphere of inhuman dismissal.
Humans need to draw the line at paganism, men and women alike.
MOHTARMA BENAZIR BHUTTO was a great leader.She was my idol personality.She was our asset.Her assassination was a great lost for our country.Which could never be filled.
Thank you, Miss Wilson, for your thoughtful and encouraging words on women’s leadership including our brave heroine, Benazir Bhutto. Realizing that her life was surrounded by constant danger, she still had the incredible courage to go on with herself. I can’t describe in words what I am feeling right now about her because she was truly magnificent and beautiful. She fought and stood up for what she believed in and sacrificed her life for it. It’s up to the women of the world to harness man’s hostility towards others. I’m sure Benazir Bhutto believed that education is the key if we are all to survive in this world. It was admirable that Bhutto’s son (who looks just like her I might add) wants to take up his mother’s noble cause and move on, and that he willing to pay the ultimate price for it like his mother. I’m not sure if Benazir would have approved of it or would she?
It seems that the good who always want peace in the world are always knocked down before they could rise any further while the bad get away with their rotten agendas of killing them. How can we ever expect peace in the world when we have an antagonist for war in our office, the people’s white house? How can we expect peace in our own country knowing that our presidential elections were stolen twice in row?
In honor of Benazir Bhutto, and people like her, I will always stand up for peace, truth, and justice for all.
Don’t allow our elections to be stolen again, insist on the truth and count every vote because it says so in our own Constitution! And if we care about it, we will not allow a president and vice president to spit on it, stomp on it, or rip it apart !
They have broken their oath of office and should be held accountable!
With Benazir Bhutto’s passing, our world has lost a great ally in the fight for democracy. Your stirring words “she came home willingly to die” haunt me, Ms. Wilson. In their gief, hopefully, her beloved citizenry will flesh out the terrorist evil and mete out swift justice. In my grief, I am uplifted by the thought that because of her tremendous courage, the free world will be changed.
Indeed, Benazir Bhutto’s assasination is horrifying. I have watched her career since she came into office. Who knows what wonders she might have brought Pakistan had she won election.
I grieve
We must not complacently believe that it could not happen here. While I was vice mayor in my town outside St Petersburg FL, I did receive a public death threat and was run off the road in front of my home. I was not alone in this experience then nor now. I am absolutely certain that Senator Clinton has been so assaulted, too, as many other female officials have told me. The men scoff when we report it.
It is this perpetual staggering indifference from some men in power that drives me mad.
I am founder and president of the grassroots, nonpartisan, single-issue Equal Rights Alliance Inc. which is working hard/, struggling actually, to get Florida ratifiied for the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) that barely missed passing by 3 states in 1982. Yes, ERA is re-ignited, is still needed, and STILL NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT.
For starters, please get to know us at http://www.RatifyERAflorida.net. Then see what easy things you can do to Propel ERA for the benefit of men AND women and the economy. Reach me: RatifyERA@cs.com.
Benazir Bhutto’s tragic assassination points to the reason why volumes of women need to step into leadership roles of all kinds and at all levels–to eliminate the imbalance that is caused by male dominance and the subsequent inequities that prevail in a patriarchal society; and to create a balance of men and women that has never before existed in any culture. I believe it will take actions such as Martin Luther King’s fight for civil rights before we will begin to make a significant difference. Add women, change everything.
I was not only saddened by the assination of Benazir Bhutto, but by the talking heads who said that her murder dealt a blow to the democratization process. I truly believe that she returned to her country either determined to advance the cause or be martyred in the trying. Her loss should inspire her countrymen and women to push harder to accomplish her goals.
I don’t think her murder was a gender thing. It was a leader thing. Truly great leaders who have the courage to effect real change always engender hatred. Consider the fhundreds of assassination attempts on the life of the governor of Al Anbar Province, Iraq, when he’d finally had enough of the Muslim fanatics and started to lead his people towards a sustainable, fair future.
Yes, death is sometime the price of democracy. The greatest generation and those lives they saved with their blood understand this. Now it falls to our generation to see if we are made of the stuff to guarantee democracy’s future.
The connection between the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and violence against women in general is so strong it screams out to all of us. Women must be seen as valuable, intregral members of every society. We have to finally end the belief that men have the right to rule and abuse women. Women have so much to offer as leaders, and Bhutto’s death can only have meaning if we all commit to end violence against women and girls, once and for all.
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