Asif Ali President Ten PercentZardari,
... sticky-fingered husband of the late Benazir Bhutto ...
on Tuesday used a speech on the fourth anniversary of the liquidation of his wife, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto,
... 11th Prime Minister of Pakistain in two non-consecutive terms from 1988 until 1990 and 1993 until 1996. She was the daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, founder of the Pakistain People's Party, who was murdered at the instigation of General Ayub Khan. She was murdered in her turn by person or persons unknown while campaigning in late 2007. Suspects include, to note just a few, Baitullah Mehsud, General Pervez Musharraf, the ISI, al-Qaeda in Pakistain, and her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, who shows remarkably little curiosity about who done her in...
to issue a firm challenge to those within the unstable south Asian nation who wish to unseat him.
The 56-year-old president told tens of thousands of people gathered at the Bhutto family shrine at Garhi Khuda Baksh in the southern Sindh province that the best way to pay tribute to his late wife, killed while campaigning in elections in 2007, was "to defend and protect democracy and democratic institutions in the country and foil all conspiracies against it".
The speech was Zardari's first public appearance since returning last week from Dubai where he had been receiving medical treatment for a suspected minor stroke and comes amid a welter of speculation that Pakistain's powerful military, which has ruled the country for much of its 64-year independent existence, is about to step in.
Zardari told the crowd that Bhutto's assassins "may have succeeded in eliminating her physically but [her] ideas and ideals ... shall never be killed".
Relations between Zardari, who became president in the wake of his wife's death, and the military have always been tense but have deteriorated significantly in recent months. Senior officers believe Zardari or close aides penned a leaked unsigned -- and unauthenticated -- memo appealing to Washington for aid in heading off a military coup earlier this year. Hearings into the affair are being held by Pakistain's supreme court and could seriously destabilise the government.
Aides of Zardari privately claim the senior judiciary are acting in concert with senior military officers to force the president out. In a jibe at judges, Zardari raised the unsolved case of his wife's liquidation in his speech.
Both elected and military officials have appeared to back away from confrontation in recent days however. General Ashfaq Kayani
... four star general, current Chief of Army Staff of the Mighty Pak Army. Kayani is the former Director General of ISI...
, the chief of army staff and the most senior soldier in the country, has, via a military front man, denied any intention to mount a coup.
On Monday Yusuf Raza Gilani
... Pakistain's erstwhile current prime minister, whose occasional feats of mental gymnastics can be awe-inspiring ...
, the prime minister, denied domestic media reports that he was planning to sack both Kayani and the head of the main Pak military spy service, the ISI, saying the military supported democracy.
One bigwig in the ruling Pakistain People's party, founded by Benazir Bhutto's father, said on Tuesday that there was no question of the president resigning, whatever the pressure.
"He's a fighter. He's not going anywhere," the official said.