Benazir Bhutto inherited her role as party leader and self-proclaimed champion of the poor when her father was overthrown as Prime Minister by the military and executed in 1979.

She has kept his slogan (“Bread, clothes and shelter”), and yesterday Karachi was papered with images of the two Bhuttos, the posters obliterating road signs and traffic lights. The coming days will reveal how much Ms Bhutto has been damaged by her power-sharing deal with President Musharraf, the military leader who seized power in 1999.

He has promised not to pursue the corruption charges that she fled in 1999, in return for the PPP’s tacit support for his re-election to another five-year term.

The President, whose popularity has collapsed since he tried to dismiss the Chief Justice, now faces more confrontation with the courts. Yesterday the Supreme Court said that it wanted more time to consider whether his reelection was legal. It may also contest his ordinance granting Ms Bhutto an amnesty, and could challenge her desire to change the Constitution to allow herself to serve a third term.

In contrast, Nawaz Sharif, the leader of the conservative Pakistan Muslim League, also a former Prime Minister, has claimed the high ground for “refusing to do deals with dictators”. But he was humiliated when he attempted to return last month: after four hours he was bundled on to an aircraft to Saudi Arabia.

Britain and the US have championed Ms Bhutto, believing that she and President Musharraf share secular, liberal goals and that their partnership is the best way of edging Pakistan towards democracy while retaining a reliable ally against terrorism. But the risk is that the constitutional abuses practised in this cause will inflame extremists. Yesterday Ms Bhutto brushed aside criticism, saying that she was Pakistan’s best hope. “If we want to save Pakistan from extremists we have to have democracy,” she said.

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