Department of State

AIRGRAM

CONFIDENTIAL A- 121

TO: Department of State DATE : November 7, 1967

INFO: RAWALPINDI, KARACHI, LAHORE, PESHAWAR

FROM: AmConGen DACCA

SUBJECT : Bhutto Visits East Pakistan-A Political Foray REF

SUMMARY:

Former Pakistani Foreign Minister Zulfigar All Bhutto came last week to East Pakistan; he saw much of opposition politicians and newspaper men; but he conquered few political hearts, in the opinion of most observers. Still, Bhutto is entitled to every credit for giving a very difficult situation the old college try. Given the handicaps of his position he turned in a fully professional performance. He generally blasted the central government; played up strongly to special Bengali sensitivities; paying careful obeisance to jailed Awami League chief, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman; courted all factions among the East Pakistani opposition (itself bitterly divided); and permitted another by-now-not-so-exciting glimpse at his much-heralded but still unlaunched new political party. If Bhutto's attempts at skipping nimbly over certain political obstacles sometimes seemed more like rather heavy-footed trodding, still he could honestly console himself that few men could have done better in the circumstances. END OF SUMMARY.

Bhutto arrived in Dacca on October 20 where he put up at the Intercontinental Hotel and where he quickly held a press conference. From this symbolic redoubt of capitalism it was learned by one of the Bengali language dailies that Bhutto's new party might be called the Democratic Socialist Party. Bhutto told the Pakistan Press Association (PPA) during the same press conference that he expected a wide area of understanding and cooperation between his proposed political party and other opposition forces. Bhutto believed all opposition elements could agree on a complete restoration of democratic rights, attainment of adult franchise and freedom of the press. He announced his intention of getting in touch with different political parties and groups, such as youth and intellectuals, during his East Bengal stay to determine how cooperation could best be achieved. He would meet leaders of the Awami League, National Awami Party, Pakistan Democratic Movement and National Democratic Front. He slyly revealed that he had asked East Pakistan Governor Abdul Monem Khan for permission (which he had every reason to know would not be granted) to call on his erstwhile enemy, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, in Dacca's Central Jail.

The former Foreign Minister was busy with his consultations for the next several days and news of his activities faded from the press, but we know from reliable sources that he did call on ancient National Awami Party leader Maulana Bhashani during this period. On October 26 Bhutto hit the newspapers again following an address the previous day before students at Dacca's Engineers' Institute Hall during which he called on the GOP to release from jail AL leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Blithely ignoring his own public blasts against Sheikh Mujibur last year when he was still the Foreign Minister and a part of the Establishment, Bhutto praised the imprisoned opposition chief as a man who had sacrificed much for Pakistani independence. He did not see Sheikh Mujib's famous Six Points as implying East Pakistani secession, forgetting that this was exactly what he had charged last year.

During the same address Bhutto asked the central government to restore all democratic rights and end high handedness and exploitation. He found that the national economy was in crisis. The rich were getting richer at the expense of the masses. He landed what he appears to have regarded as a telling blow when he found the present Government's economic policy to be capitalistic in nature. He found frustration and despair rampant among the people who were described as crying for a change. Aiming a blow at the Government's moves against Bengali cultural activity, Bhutto believed that national integration would not be achieved by talks and messages over propaganda media but rather by good will and equal treatment.

As a critic of the central Government, Bhutto was piling up points but he found himself clinching for protection during the question period when one of his audience fired two jolting questions.

What was Bhutto's stand on One Unit and on the issue of (East Pakistani) provincial autonomy? Bhutto sidestepped, if not very nimbly. Starting bravely, he found that both issues were very important. They should be decided, he concluded lamely, by the elected representatives of the people.

The address to the students may have been the high point of Bhutto's political foray into East Pakistan although he also scored well during a pre-departure press conference at the Intercontinental on October 26. This was perhaps best covered in a long article in the Pakistan Observer of October 27. A reading of that article will show, however, that Bhutto also faltered badly, not in simply sidestepping delicate political issues, but in failing to allay suspicions that he is an ambitious opportunists.

Bhutto hit with well-aimed ridicule the central Government's champion of cultural purity, Minister of Communications A. Sabur Khan. He said Sabur's strictures against the greatest of all Bengali language poets, Rabindranath Tagore (a Hindu),- would only be comparable to the American's banning Shakespeare on the grounds that the latter is English. While Bhutto's victory over Sabur was decisive it really amounted to taking candy from a baby. For Sabur Khan has a local reputation for being both unlettered and short on mental agility as well. As long as the Government puts itself

in the ridiculous position of appearing to be against culture, it can count on being made to look ridiculous and by opponents far less clever than Bhutto.

During his final press conference in East Pakistan Bhutto resumed his all-out attack on the Rawalpindi Government. He charged that the price of jute was falling in relation to rice, which caught the peasants in a price squeeze. Meanwhile the Government was following an exravagant import policy of feeding those (uneconomic) industries which it had nurtured over the years.

He found foreign policy burdened with contradictions. Military aid from the Western bloc had stopped. Yet Pakistan remained in SEATO and CENTO. India refused to settle Kashmir, continued work on the Farrakka Barrage, continued the usurpation of Berubari, and armed itself to the teeth. Yet Pakistan welcomed the Indian Army Chief of Staff in Islamabad. While on the one hand ignoring armed physical aggression, Bhutto went on sacrcastically, the central Government talked loudly of a cultural invasion and instructed people what poet to read and what not to read.

When attacking the Government Bhutto sounded convincing because the fact is that Rawalpindi is vulnerable, in Bengali eyes, on a number of fronts. But on two questions which bear on his own judgment and personal integrity, Bhutto acquited himself much less well. Sensitive to charges that he had turned against the Pakistan Muslim League (PML), of which he was Secretary General for four years, only because the PML had thrown him out, Bhutto volunteered at the October 26 press conference that he had finally left the league after losing all hope of reforming it from within. He alleged that conditions within the League had deteriorated to such an extent that the regime had been forced to bring in old politicians whom the regime itself had earlier denounced to save the League from total collapse.

Bhutto found himself in really deep water when asked why he was forming a third party rather than joining forces with existing opposition groups. He replied vaguely that the present situation did not favor his joining any of the opposition parties. The usually articulate Bhutto ventured even further into obscurantism when he added that "ideological rifts developing within different parties ...constituted one of the main reasons which prevented him from joining those parties". Having enlightened probably no one, Bhutto commented that he nevertheless found party splits to be a good thing in that they served to crystallize ideology.

Asked about his views on Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the Six Points, Bhutto clarified his position. He agreed with the problems raised in the Six Points but not with all the solutions suggested by Sheikh Mujib. In any case, he said reasonably, the Six Points were not religious scripture but could be subject of negotiations.

Speaking finally of the prospects for his new party, Bhutto professed to have found the West Pakistani reaction "encouraging". He looked forward to a good response in East Pakistan also. But he added that nothing spectacular was expected, "nor do we want it. We have certainly chosen the hard way". On this note Bhutto concluded his foray to East Pakistan.

Press coverage of Bhutto's activities was generally moderate and balanced, with one glaring exception. The press Trust's Morning News published a scathing editorial

on October 30 which likened Bhutto to a vain actor "strutting" about a stage. He was said to have identified himself "with the role that was assigned him" and had had to be sharply called to order.

Comment: How did Bhutto do in East Pakistan? Actually a better question might beHow well will he do? It is, of course, too early to say. For the present it may be said that he has kept his options open. He played to local prejudices, hit the central government in vulnerable spots, tried to avoid offending any group and attempted to soften suspicions that he is an opportunist.

But it is not too early to say that Bhutto is under very heavy handicaps in East Pakistan. He is a West winger and on an issue of central interest to Bengalis, i.e., provincial autonomy, he declined to take a stand. Bengalis are notoriously suspicious of outsiders and Bhutto's sidestepping is not likely to establish confidence in his integrity. Further people over here will not be quick to forget that Bhutto was the official head for four years of the PML, a party which he now denounces.

Another special handicap is that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is reliably understood to despise Bhutto both for Bhutto's playing footsy with communism as well as for his earlier public attacks on Mujib in which Mujib was practically condemned as a traitor. Nothing Bhutto can now do is ever likely to gain Sheikh Mujib's confidence and Mujib, as by far the strongest opposition figure, is in a position, even from his jail cell, to cripple Bhutto's future political efforts in the East Wing.

Finally, one may legitimately wonder whether Bhutto offers any answers to the termendious social and economic problems facing this wing. His latest performance is not likely to reassure doubters. At this moment Bhutto's foray does not appear to have broadened his base of support much beyond the not very strong politically New Left (see Dacca's A-361 of May 10, 1966).

METCALF

Source: The American Papers- Secret and Confidential India.Pakistan.Bangladesh Documents 1965-1973, The University Press Limited, p.235-238