With PTI down on its luck, will MQMP be able to win battle for Karachi?

KARACHI: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan is facing the daunting challenge of regaining its position as the most popular political party of Karachi in the February 8 general elections.

In 2018 general elections, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) replaced the MQM as the city’s most popular party by winning the most number of seats in the city.

This time the PTI candidates are contesting the polls independently because of denial of the party’s famous “bat” election symbol to them. But the worries of the MQM have been far from over. Its leadership is not sure about the current status of party’s popularity among the masses.

The merger of Pak Sarzaeen Party led by Mustafa Kamal and Farooq Sattar-led faction of the party into the MQM was lately two important developments that have the potential to brighten the electoral prospects of the party. Afterwards, the PSP’s former head office in Block-6 of PECHS “Pakistan House” is being used as the nerve centre of the MQM’s poll campaign. Both the MQM’s headquarters in Bahadurabad and the Pakistan House have been the venues of important meetings of the party in the run-up to the polls.

The appeal of London-based MQM founder Altaf Hussain, in a video message on the internet, to the people of Karachi not to vote for the MQM-Pakistan could also dent the electoral prospects of the party.

Contesting the February 8 general polls is virtually like the MQM entering unchartered waters as the party decided to boycott the local government elections held in Karachi and Hyderabad a year back. Many concerned quarters criticised the decision of the MQM to stay away from the municipal polls in the two main urban centres of the province on account of controversial delimitations of constituencies. The Pakistan Peoples Party won the majority number of seats, while the Jamaat-e-Islami remained runner-up, and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf secured third position in the local government polls held on January 15, 2023. Many political observers believe that the MQM shouldn’t have stayed away from the municipal elections irrespective of its popularity graph given that the public deliverance at the local government-level has always been the forte of the party.

Since the announcement of the date of the upcoming general elections, the mayor and deputy mayor of Karachi belonging to the PPP and town and union committee chairmen in the city from the JI have stepped up their drives for launching and inaugurating new development projects including parks and playgrounds.

No surprise that after being left out of the arena of local governments, the MQM had to write a letter to the Election Commission of Pakistan, urging it to issue directives for halting development works by the municipal agencies after the announcement of the poll schedule so that uplift activities shouldn’t influence the election outcome. In the letter sent to the chief election commissioner, MQM-Pakistan Convener Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui said the mayors of cities and chairmen of the municipal agencies continuously launching development projects had been violating the election rules. He was of the view that the halting of development works by the municipal agencies was one of the prerequisites of providing a level playing field to all the political parties contesting the general elections. Khawaja Izharul Hassan, a senior MQM leader, complained on Saturday that elected local government representatives belonging to the PPP and the JI in the city had been brazenly violating the election laws with no authority available to make them accountable for these violations.

He recalled that the MQM had not used the municipal funds and resources available to run the party’s election campaign for the 2008 general elections when the office of mayor and the local government system in the city were relatively strong. He said the incumbent mayor, Barrister Murtaza Wahab, had been inaugurating development projects funded by the World Bank and the Asian Development to give undue credit to his party. Similarly, the union committee chairmen and other local government representatives belonging to the JI in the city had been campaigning in favour of the candidates of their party, he said. He said the municipal commissioners, deputy commissioners, and municipal commissioners posted in Karachi and Hyderabad had been removing the MQM’s flags at the behest of the PPP. He said the MQM had gathered video and pictorial evidence proving that electoral laws and rules were being violated in the city. He alleged that the clauses 9, 11, 21, 23 of the Elections Act-2017 were being violated.

In 2018, the MQM secured six general seats of the National Assembly from Karachi and Hyderabad. It had the strength of seven lawmakers in the previous house of the National Assembly after getting a reserved seat for women. In the past house of the Sindh Assembly, the MQM had the total strength of 21 legislators with 16 lawmakers elected against general seats and the rest were holding seats reserved for women and minorities. One of the MQM lawmakers, Rana Ansar, became first-ever female Leader of Opposition in the Sindh Assembly replacing Haleem Adil Sheikh of the PTI days before the dissolution of the assemblies in the country.

For the February 8 general elections, the MQM has fielded a total of 136 candidates to contest for general seats of the National Assembly and the Sindh provincial assembly. For the National Assembly seats, the MQM has fielded a total of 46 candidates, including 40 male and six female candidates. For the Sindh Assembly constituencies, it has fielded 90 candidates, including 86 males and four female candidates. When contacted, MQM senior leader and former lawmaker Muhammad Hussain Khan remarked that in his viewpoint his party would win all the seats in the city in the upcoming polls. “The media is free to conduct surveys and independently seek opinion from the people in the city about the popularity of any political party contesting the upcoming polls,” he said. Hassan Kazmi, a Karachi-based senior journalist associated with foreign media, said he was sure that the MQM would secure a greater number of seats in the Sindh Assembly in the upcoming general elections as compared to its tally of its victories in the 2018 general elections. “I would not be surprised if the MQM in the February 8 general polls won up to 12 seats of the National Assembly in Karachi as a big factor in this success would be voters and supporters of the PTI not voting for the party-backed candidates after sensing that Imran Khan has no chance to become the next prime minister,” he said.