Political parties warn against stoking ethnic tension following Ranjhani’s killing

The recent killings of Irshad Ranjhani in Karachi and three labourers in Larkana prompted responses from three major political parties on Thursday as they held separate news conferences to share their standpoint about the incidents.

In their respective events, the Awami National Party (ANP), the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) criticised the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)-led provincial government for mishandling the incidents by giving them ethnic colour and vowed to foil the conspiracy afoot to fuel ethnic violence in the province.

Ranjhani, a Jeay Sindh Tehreek leader, was shot dead on February 6 by a Cattle Colony UC chairman, Abdul Raheem Shah. DIG East Amir Farooqui claimed that according to police investigations, Ranjhani had intended to rob the UC chairman after which he was shot in self-defence by the latter. However, the slain man’s family claimed that Ranjhani had nothing to do with any robbery and was killed in a brutal way.

The police later also arrested the UC chairman for denying medical help to Ranjhani after shooting him. A few days after Ranjhani was killed, unidentified men killed in Larkana three Pashtun labourers hailing from Bajaur on Wednesday.

ANP’s stance

Speaking at a news conference at his residence, ANP provincial chief Shahi Syed said after the video of Ranjhani’s killing went viral on social media, some anti-peace forces tried to fuel ethnic tension among various communities in the province.

“It is high time for political parties, religious scholars and civil society to jointly foil theconspiracy,” Syed told media persons after having discussed the two killing incidents in separate meetings of the ANP and the Pashtun Action Committee (Loya Jirga) earlier in the day.

Former provincial minister of the PPP Pir Mazharul Haq also accompanied Syed at the press conference. The ANP leader also praised Qaumi Awami Tehreek head Ayaz Latif Palijo for cancelling his party’s call to strike on February 14, which had earlier been announced to protest the killing of Ranjhani, after the Larkana tragedy.

Mentioning his meeting with Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, the ANP leader said the CM assured him that the culprits responsible for the killings of Pashtun labourers would be arrested.

PTI questions CM’s ‘silence’

The PTI lawmakers from Karachi criticised the Sindh government for making Ranjhani’s killing an ethnic issue and questioned why the CM was silent on the cases of other people who were killed in similar illegal manner in the province.

Two PTI MPAs, Saeed Afridi and Shahnawaz Jadoon, who are both ethnic Pashtuns, in a press conference at the party’s secretariat condemned the murder of Ranjhani. “If the UC chairman was Pashto-speaking, he was neither our representative nor the Pashto-speaking people supported him. Any Pakistani who saw this video was grieved,” Afridi said.

Terming the CM’s speech on Ranjhani’s killing in the Sindh Assembly ‘provocative’, Afridi said the provincial government made it a lingual or ethnic issue and the PTI was concerned that it could harm harmony among the ethnic communities living in the province.

“Where was the CM Sindh when Naqeebullah Mehsud was killed in a fake encounter? The CM did not go for an FIR of Intizar, Amal and other people illegally killed in Sindh. Condemning the Larkana mishap, the PTI MPAs said Pashtuns living in the province were on friendly terms with Sindhis and people of both the ethnicities respected each other. They also informed media persons that PTI leader Haleem Adil Shaikh is in Bajaur to condole with the families of the slain labourers.

The PTI leaders also criticised the CM for meeting ANP provincial chief Syed to deal with the situation after the Larkana incident. “Who gave the authority to the CM to consider Shahi Syed the representative of the Pashtun community?” asked Jadoon, saying that Pashtuns living in the city had rejected Syed and his party in the past two general elections.

PML-N calls for judicial commission

PML-N Sindh President Shah Muhammad Shah also expressed his concerns over the recent incidents and appealed to all the communities living in the province not to involve ethnicity in Ranjhani’s killing.

Flanked by party leaders Ali Akbar Gujjar and Khalid Shaikh at the Karachi Press Club, the PML-N provincial chief said a judicial commission should immediately be formed to probe the killing of Ranjhani and three Pashtun labourers in Larkana. If Ranjhani was a criminal, he should have been taken to hospital for first aid, Shah Muhammad said. “We condemn the act of not allowing him to be taken to hospital,” he said. “I have written a letter to CM Sindh Murad Ali Shah, appealing to him to play his role in resolving the sensitive issue and limit it from spreading.”