KARACHI: Sindh Governor Ishratul Ibad Khan was removed from the top constitutional position of the province on Wednesday after gaining the distinction of becoming the longest-serving governor of any of the provinces in the country. In his place, the President of Pakistan appointed Saeeduzzaman Siddiqui as the new Governor of Sindh province, who will be the 31st governor of the province.
Dr Ishratul Ibad Khan had assumed the charge of the post of Sindh governor on December 27, 2002, being the youngest governor of the country. He almost completed his 14 years term in the office of the provincial governor. Before this, he had gained the distinction of becoming the youngest member of the Sindh cabinet, becoming a provincial minister (Sindh housing minister) in 1990.
Dr Ibad had the basic political association with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement owing to which he had gained the opportunity to become a provincial minister and later the governor for the longest term in office. Last year, the MQM formally dissociated itself from the Sindh governor after the party’s headquarters Nine-Zero in Karachi was raided by the Rangers. At that time, the local MQM leadership had urged the Sindh governor to step down and once again join the party as a simple worker.
Before becoming the governor, Dr Ibad Khan had been living in London in self-exile where the rest of the top leadership of MQM had also gone to relocate to escape two operations of law-enforcement agencies in Karachi during the decade of 1990s.
The Sindh governor had assumed the office of top constitutional position after the regime led by the former military ruler Pervez Musharraf had entered into a power sharing arrangement after the 2002 general elections, both in provincial and federal level, with the MQM. During his term in office, the Sindh governor had worked with three presidents, five prime ministers, and four chief ministers of the province.
Born on March 2, 1963 in Karachi, Dr Ibad also secured his basic education in Karachi. In his later life, he had secured the MBBS degree from the Dow Medical College, Karachi. Being the governor, he was instrumental in upgrading the status of his alma mater to make it a full-fledged medical university, which was later named as the Dow University of Health Sciences. He was also instrumental in establishing the Ojha Campus of Dow University at the site of previous Ojha Sanatorium near the University Road. Being the chancellor of public sector universities in the province, Ibad saw major expansion of the higher education sector in the province as a number of public and private universities and institutes of higher education were established in different towns of the province during this time. He also focused on expansion and development of projects of public health in Karachi and the rest of the province.
He had visited the sites of under-development north-bound track of Lyari Expressway and Bus Rapid Transit Service project in Karachi the other day. That proved to be his last official outing in the city.
During the period of PPP-led rule, Dr Ibad had to leave the country on various occasions when the ties of MQM had deteriorated with the ruling parties. One such significant occasion came when on 27 June, 2011, the Sindh governor had left the country when the MQM had announced to part ways with the-then set-up of coalition government. Ibad Khan had come back to the country on 19 July, 2011.
New Sindh governor’s profile: Born in December, 1937 in Lucknow, the 79-year-old has become one of the oldest governors of the province. Siddiqui had previously served as the chief justice of Pakistan as after the military takeover of October 1999 by General Pervez Musharraf, he was deposed from the office as he refused to take fresh oath of office under the Provincial Constitutional Order after the Constitution had been held in abeyance by the military regime of that time.
He had reportedly said on the occasion of refusing the fresh oath of office under the military regime: “”Taking an oath under the PCO, in my opinion, will be a deviation from the oath I had taken to defend the Constitution of 1973”.
He was the candidate of Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) for election to the office of president of the country held in September, 2008 after Pervez Musharraf had stepped down. Nawaz Sharif had announced Siddiqui’s candidature for presidential election on 25 August, 2008. He had lost that presidential election by 153 votes to Asif Ali Zardari who had then become the new president of the country. Nawaz Sharif proposed his name to President Mamnoon Hussain to become the new governor of the province after the removal of Dr Ishratul Ibad Khan.