Ghani advises MQM-P against using violence, threats ahead of polls

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Karachi President Saeed Ghani has claimed that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan’s (MQM-P) former leaders who chose to quit the party to join the PPP are being threatened by the MQM-P.

Ghani, who served as Sindh’s labour minister in the previous government, made this claim while speaking at a press conference at the media cell of the Bilawal House on Monday. Former MQM-P MPA Shiraz Waheed announced joining the PPP on the occasion.

The PPP city chief advised the MQM-P to use political and peaceful means in accordance with the law to compete against its political opponents instead of using threats and violence, which he claimed have been hallmarks of the party’s politics.

He said the MQM-P should desist from such unlawful ways of politicking for the sake of maintaining peace in the city. He urged the election commission and other relevant national agencies to take notice of MQM-P leader Mustafa Kamal’s threatening tone in his speeches at recent public meetings.

He pointed out that the PPP’s opponents are not ready to accept the party’s rising popularity in the city. He also said workers from different political parties have started joining the PPP in every district of the city.

The former minister said that the anti-PPP forces in the province would be defeated in the upcoming general elections despite forming electoral alliances, as had happened in the past polls.

He claimed that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Grand Democratic Alliance and the MQM-P want the bureaucracy in the province to work to serve their political interests. He said the MQM-P has adopted the same path that was adopted by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf to put undue pressure on the national institutions before elections.

The bureaucracy in the province has been reshuffled multiple times to the extent that any efficient officer working during the PPP’s past government has been removed, he added. Ghani said the PML-N wants to use the MQM-P to achieve its ulterior political motives in the province just like the MQM-P has been exploited earlier by other parties in the same manner.

He appealed to the MQM-P to not become a part of any such conspiracy for the sake of peace in the city. He reiterated the PPP’s stance that every contesting political party should get a level playing field in the upcoming general elections.

PPP Sindh General Secretary Waqar Mehdi said on the occasion that the party’s popularity has been rapidly increasing in the city. He claimed that leaders belonging to other political parties have been joining the PPP in droves.

Mehdi said the MQM-P has become very upset on seeing the PPP’s rising popularity in the city. He said the MQM-P has again started practising politics of hatred and division. The city’s residents will vote for the PPP in overwhelming numbers in the upcoming general elections, he added.