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Tuesday March 19, 2024

‘Even 40 years not enough for PPP to claim city’

By our correspondents
November 21, 2017
The ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) cannot politically occupy Karachi even if it keeps struggling to achieve the end for another four decades, Khawaja Izharul Hassan said on Monday.
The opposition leader in Sindh Assembly belonging to the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) was addressing the media after the PA sitting was adjourned without any formal proceedings in view of PPP leader Makhdoom Muhammad Amin Fahim’s second death anniversary.
Hassan’s statement comes a day after PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari had claimed that his party would emerge as the largest political entity of the city if its people were allowed to vote independently in the upcoming general elections.
On Monday, however, Hassan said the PPP should first safeguard its own electoral seat in the city’s Lyari Town, which the party could lose in the future. He advised PPP MPA Saeed Ghani against misguiding his own party on the issue of political supremacy in the metropolis.
The PA opposition leader said Ghani had barely been able to secure a victory in the recently held by-election in the provincial assembly’s PS-114 constituency in the city.
He said the people of Sindh had started exhibiting signs of opposition against the PPP, adding that the party’s future in the province was at stake.
He claimed that the PPP had to face mutiny within its own ranks, which would become visible at the time of the next general elections.
The MQM-P leader said the Sindh government’s performance had been clearly exposed in Thar, where a drought-like situation had emerged as well as food shortage for children while people were surviving without potable water.
Just over a week ago, PPP Sindh General Secretary Waqar Mehdi had said in a statement that his party would never abandon the people of the city, as all their grievances would be resolved and their rights ensured.
Mehdi said the MQM and its splinter groups could not fool the Urdu-speaking community any more, adding that communal politics should come to an end. “Whether it’s MQM-P or the London faction, they have always caused hardships for the Urdu-speaking community.”
He said the community had always been loyal and patriotic, striving for the welfare and protection of the country. “But it’s wrong to give the impression that they are being singled out and subjected to persecution, as this is the work of some miscreants politicking on bias.”
The PPP leader said the people knew very well the tactics of such politicking, adding that in reality, the basic rights of the people were trampled upon to plunder money and resources.
He said the MQM had grabbed ample opportunities in the past to undertake historical steps to entirely transform Karachi, but all such prospects had been entirely lost.
The MQM has always agitated against lack of powers available to its elected authorities but it refrains from taking steps required for the welfare and wellbeing of the people despite the fact that they were easily doable for the party, he added.
PA sitting adjourned
The provincial legislature was called to order on Monday after a delay of 70 minutes instead of the session being convened at the scheduled time of 10am.
After recitation of the holy Quran and Naat, Health Minister Dr Sikandar Ali Mandhro drew the attention of PA Deputy Speaker Syeda Shehla Raza towards Fahim’s second death anniversary.
Mandhro said the programme to mark Fahim’s death anniversary was being organised in Hala, and the lawmakers needed to leave for the city to attend it. He requested Shehla to adjourn the sitting. The deputy speaker obliged and adjourned the session until 10am on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Hassan said Fahim was a politician of great stature and calibre. He said that instead of abruptly adjourning the sitting, it would have been better if the lawmakers had been allowed to pay tributes to the senior PPP leader.