Our protest for Karachi’s rights will go beyond the CM House: Kamal

With the blazing sun sending temperatures soaring in the city on Tuesday, the Pak Sarzameen Party (PSP) too decided to turn up the political heat on the provincial government.

Speaking to The News on what was the sixth day of his party's protest, PSP chairman Syed Mustafa Kamal vowed to push his movement for Karachi’s right to the next level. 

“We have conveyed our message to the masses. People are coming in large numbers at our camp to express their solidarity with our cause,” Kamal said.

“We have now decided to move forward since this sit-in has already been successful in helping people realise their rights and making them stand for ensuring civil liberties,” he said.

To a query, he said the party did not have any plan to stage a sit-in outside the Chief Minister House.” Our mission is to move far beyond the walls of the CM House,” he said with a smile.

Talking about his working relationship with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan, Kamal said he was in constant touch with MQM-P chief Dr Farooq Sattar. “Our doors are open for everybody,” he said.

Kamal said the level of the party’s movement would go high with everyday passing. “The struggle will go on until we pull off our assignment.”

PSP Vice President Dr Sagheer Ahmed reiterated that the sit-in would continue till the government fulfilled their demands.

A day earlier, the party vowed to continue the protest until all 16 of its demands were met by the government.

The party's leaders also warned that all negotiations would be in vain if the government failed to actually take practical measures to address the city's issues.

Addressing protesters at the KPC on Monday, PSP President Anis Qaimkhani said the party was looking forward to talks but would take to streets if the negotiations failed.

Earlier on Friday, another lawmaker of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Iritiza Khalil Farooqui, announced his inclusion in the PSP as he joined the party’s sit-in staged outside the KPC.

Farooqui, is was the seventh MQM lawmaker to join the Mustafa Kamal-led party, was welcomed by the PSP central leadership on the second day of their protest against the Sindh government for keeping the city ‘deprived of its due rights’.

Stating the reason for switching his loyalty, legislator Irtiza Khalil Farooqui said it was related to the MQM’s connections with the Indian spy agency RAW.

Had the MQM cared about its supporters, he said, its workers would not have thought to quit the party.

Farooqui, who returned to Pakistan from Dubai on Friday morning as he had left the country following a crackdown was started against the MQM in 2013, said that nobody put him under pressure to switch his loyalty.

The dissident leader had won the PS-119 seat on MQM’s ticket in the 2013 general elections. He is the seventh MQM MPA who has jumped the Muttahida’s ship to join the PSP. The others are Dilawar Hussain, Dr Sagheer Ahmed, Iftikhar Alam, Bilquis Mukhtar, Ashfaq Mangi and Sheikh Abdullah.