Two MQM-Pakistan legislators defect to Kamal’s party

Two legislators affiliated with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) announced on Wednesday that they are joining former Karachi mayor Mustafa Kamal’s Pak Sarzameen Party (PSP), reports Geo News.

Naheed Begum, a member of the provincial assembly of Sindh (MPA) from the PSW-153 constituency, and Naila Munir, an MPA on a reserved seat for women from the RSW-155 constituency, announced joining the PSP during a news conference.

Addressing the media, party chief Kamal called for an end to alleged atrocities against the people of the city. “The representatives whom the people elected have sided with thieves,” he claimed. “They always voted for the MQM, but the party did nothing for them.”

The former mayor held the MQM responsible, first and foremost, and then the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) for the prevalent state of the financial capital of the country.

On January 13 the PSP had claimed of inducting more than 1,200 workers belonging to different political parties. The party’s president, Anis Qaimkhani, had made the announcement during a news conference at the PSP headquarters, Pakistan House.

Qaimkhani said 26 of the workers who joined his party had served in central cabinets of different wings of the MQM-P, while majority of the remaining also belonged to the same party.

The development had seemed to deal a major blow to the MQM-P, which is arguably leading the competition among Karachi-based political parties in terms of public support.

Despite demonstrating its strength in a public rally at the Liaquatabad flyover on November 5 last year, the MQM-P still seems prone to suffering more such losses because of the suspected attempts to re-engineer the political landscape by certain quarters of the establishment and alleged infighting at the top level.

With the induction of 1,248 workers, the PSP is hopeful of steering to triumph in the next general elections, which are due this year and would be the party’s first.