KARACHI: Hundreds of thousands of supporters of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto gathered in her home town yesterday to mark the first anniversary of her assassination.

Almost a year has passed since Benazir was assassinated. Since then, quite a few things have changed. First, President Musharraf bowed out and resigned. Secondly, Bhutto’s widower and a controversial political figure, Asif Ali Zardari was sworn in as the president of Pakistan.

Apart from that Pakistan is going through major internal strife with growing sectarianism threatening the country while foreign relations are growing awry too with India and Pakistan on the brink of a war.

Though democracy prevails and a dictator has been forced out, many believe that Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Zardari’s ascent to power was the result of sympathy votes that PPP got as a result of her tragic death. They also feel that things would be different.

Maria Memon, a young lady from Lahore says that she was stunned when she heard the news of Benazir’s death. “I could not believe that someone larger than life can also die and it took a whole week for the reality to sink in.”

Hasan Tahir Siddiqui, yet another young Pakistani, feels that things might have been different if Benazir had been around.

“She was a born politician and though her past tenures were nothing spectacular, she would still be better then the present rulers who are self obsessed to the core,” laments Hasan.

Uzma Osman also agrees with Hasan and says, “Benazir was popular with people and maybe after the time she spent exile, she might have been the perfect power player we needed.” She says that being a hardcore politician, BB would have been able to maneuver out of the crucial phase that the country is going through.

Zardari, in a statement marking the anniversary, said the attack on his wife was an attack on the viability of the state and aimed at undermining efforts to build democratic structures and to fighting militancy. “The tyrants and the killers have killed her but they shall never be able to kill her ideas that drove and inspired a generation to lofty aims,” Zardari said.

Security was tight at the Bhutto family’s graveyard in the village of Garhi Khuda Bakhsh, in Sindh province. She was buried next to her father, former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was hanged in 1979 after being deposed in a military coup.