ISLAMABAD: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) is confronted with a huge challenge to forestall arrest of its formal mayoral candidate, Wasim Akhtar, for Karachi before his sure election by the end of the current month as more pressure has been mounted on it.
While Wasim Akhtar is running from one court to another to secure bails in different criminal cases including sedition and terrorism, the confessional statements recorded by two suspects, Khalid Shamim and Mohsin Ali Syed, admitting the assassination of Dr Imran Farooq on senior party leaders’ orders in London in 2010, has compounded the MQM’s traumas.
There is no roadblock in the way of thumping triumph of Wasim Akhtar as the next Karachi mayor due to the sweeping victory of his party in the local government elections. But arrest warrants issued against him may turn out to be a significant hurdle.
If he happened to be under arrest by the time the mayoral election was held, the MQM’s woes will intensify. However, under the law Wasim Akhtar will face no legal stumbling block to vie for the most important local government slot of Pakistan. He can be barred from being in the race only by his disqualification through his conviction. His sentencing, if at all takes place, doesn’t appear on the horizon given the usual judicial process and the facility of appeals available to a convict. Superior courts will be available to overturn any such decision of a lower judicial forum or at least temporarily suspend it, giving him an opportunity to fight the election.
While hawkish Wasim Akhtar has got bails in some cases, he is still to avail of this facility in a few other proceedings. For obvious reasons, the Sindh Rangers would not like to see him as the mayor of Karachi it is engaged in a targeted operation because of his lethal verbal attacks on it for more than once. However, the Rangers are unlikely to block his election if he gets bails in all the cases lodged against him and is not arrested by then.
Unlike its past, this time the MQM has carefully commented on the confessional statements ofKhalid Shamim and Mohsin Ali Syed. It has “categorically” stated that no party personnel have had anything whatsoever to do with the tragic death of Imran Farooq. “We mourn the loss of a man who was our friend and colleague for many years.”
Thus, the MQM disownedKhalid Shamim and Mohsin Ali Syed, who had admitted in their statements that they were the MQM activists and acted on the orders of some of its leaders. This has been its standard practice. Whenever any of its activist had been caught indulging in any alleged grave criminal activity, it had distanced itself from him. Same happened to Saulat Mirza, who was recently executed for murder. The docile reaction clearly exhibited the intense pressure the MQM is feeling due to these and several other developments, which are happening over the past one year.
There was a time when the MQM would harshly take on the security agencies and the government whenever any of its workers faced an action at the hand of the law enforcement agencies. Gone are the days when it used to call shutdown of Karachi at the spur of the moment. During this period, it tried once but failed to get any respectable public response.
The MQM is in such a deep soup that it has even stopped demanding removal of ban on its chief to give interviews to the Pakistani media and take part in political activities in Pakistan through his telephonic addresses to his workers in Karachi and Hyderabad.
The reports that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) is seeking arrest warrants for Altaf Hussain, Iftikhar Hussain and another senior MQM leader Mohammad Anwar to approach the Interpol to get their custody for interrogation in the Imran Farooq murder case further heightened the party’s problems.
This process will be protracted as it usually takes a long time to produce positive results. In the instant case, there are slim chances of success any soon, considering the approach and policy of Britain to drag its feet on early murder trial. In addition, all the three persons whose custody will be sought are British citizens. But at the same time, they are also Pakistani nationals.
Disappointed with the British strategy, the Interior Ministry decided sometime back to register the murder case against the suspects arrested in Pakistan and initiate a formal trial. The recording of the confessional statements was a major step forward in these proceedings.
As per the law, the trial court has the powers to announce its judgment in absentia against the accused persons, who choose not to appear before it despite several notices and mandatory processes.