JI, PSP term Keamari district a political manoeuvre before local govt polls

Leaders of two political parties - the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and Pak Sarzameen Party (PSP) - on Friday rejected the Sindh government’s decision to make Keamari a district and called the move an attempt to divide the metropolis on ethnic lines.

The JI Karachi chapter organised a press conference at Idara Noor-e-Haq, the party’s secretariat, while the PSP held a protest demonstration outside Karachi Press Club to voice their concerns about the Sindh government’s controversial move.

‘A manoeuvre before polls’

JI Karachi chief Hafiz Naeemur Rahman said the new district would bring no change in the lives of the people of Karachi and it was only a ‘manoeuvre’ before the local bodies’ polls. The decision was made not to favour the people, but the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), he added.

“The population of Karachi was deliberately underreported in the last census. The city’s original population would be around 2.5 billion to 3 billion, according to all scientific estimates,” Rehman said. “The JI will go to court against flaws in Karachi’s population in the census.”

He was of the view that formation another district in Karachi was not the solution to the problems of the city. With six districts in the city already, the addition of another would not ensure development and prosperity of Karachi, he maintained.

He said Karachi had suffered for long due to the continuous rule of the PPP and its coalition partners. “The PPP government in Sindh has a history that it always plays a game and manoeuvres things before any elections,” the JI leader allaged. He demanded of the provincial government to hold local government polls immediately and hand over all the departments back to the municipality.

Landlords and tribal chieftains from the rural Sindh get elected by exploiting the voting rights of poor peasants and farmers and then on the basis of the highest numbers of seats in the provincial assembly, they pass new acts to loot the resources of Karachi, the JI leader said.

Mentioning the recent formation of a committee for Karachi comprising leaders of the three ruling parties in the Centre and Sindh, Rehman said it showed that they were not interested in resolving Karachi’s basic civic issues. JI leaders Usama Razi, Muslim Parvez, Raja Arif Sultan, Abdul Razzaq and Zahid Askari were also present at the press conference.

PSP’s show

Addressing a massive public rally amid heavy rain outside the Karachi Press Club, PSP Chairman Syed Mustafa Kamal said neither Sindh card nor Mohajir card would work now as it would be only PSP card that would work from now on.

Rejecting the decision to form the Keamari district, he said the PSP would never allow its motherland Sindh to be divided nor it would let anybody rip the heart of that motherland, which was Karachi.

The PSP held the protest to reject the formation of a new district in Karachi, which it said was done on ethnic grounds. “The PPP is trying to occupy Karachi. Let me assure all of you that we will take away the Sindh government from them too,” Kamal said, adding that the ruling party in Sindh was fanning ethnic fire in the province for the survival of its rule and politics.

He declared that the PSP would thwart every conspiracy of the PPP and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement to create rifts amongst the Sindhis and Muhajirs for their political gains. Kamal remarked that without Karachi, PPP's Sindh card was incomplete and so efforts were being made to occupy the metropolis. He accused the PPP’s provincial government of always making such decisions on ethnic grounds, recalling that after the census when a National Assembly seat was increased in Karachi, it was given to District West despite the fact that District Central was the largest district in the city in terms of population.

He lamented that the number of seats in District Central were rather decreased from five to four apparently because District Central was inhabited by the Urdu speaking community.

A candidate in District Central becomes an MPA with 260,000 votes, while a candidate with 56,000 votes becomes an MPA in PS-99, he said. “We do not find such a big discrepancy in the method of electing the representatives of the same city anywhere else in the world.”

Criticising the MQM along with the PPP, Kamal said the party that could not take control of even a sewerage line had started raising the slogan of a separate province. This was exactly what the PPP wanted to achieve that a voice was raised from Karachi for the division of Sindh, he claimed.

The PSP chief said when the call for breaking up Sindh was raised from Karachi, the PPP told the innocent Sindhis that the motherland of Sindh had to be saved and thus, exploiting the love of Sindhis for their motherland, the PPP tried to make them forget how their children had died due to corruption, incompetence, dog bites, malnutrition, starvation and AIDS.

Kamal said the MQM was enjoying ministries in the PPP government when the local bodies’ powers were taken away by the PPP. He asked Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah if he had created canals of milk in the six existing districts of Karachi that he wanted another district in the city.

“We are saddened about every child of Larkana, Thar and Kashmore being deprived of their rights. We are standing for their rights too. We will go to any length and on every forum against the partition of Karachi.”

Thought the PSP chief criticised the MQM, he defended the interference of the federal government in the affairs of Karachi. Those who say that the federation cannot interfere in Karachi should know that Karachi is not the occupied Kashmir, Kamal remarked.

“I ask the state institutions to come and rescue Pakistan's economic hub. The days of PPP's ethnic politics are numbered. Today, in spite of heavy rain, there are thousands of Sindhi, Punjabi, Baloch, Pakhtun and Hazara people gathered here. The PPP has failed to create rifts amongst brothers.”

The PSP chairman thanked the participants of the protest for coming their despite downpour. He said it was a test case for the people of Karachi as it was raining heavily in every part of the city and water had accumulated in the low lying areas, yet thousands of people were present there despite less than 24-hour notice.

He asked the PSP workers to go to every street and explain to everyone how the PPP was conspiring against Sindh. The city was being divided at a time when the chief justice was saying that the provincial and city governments had failed to deliver, Kamal said. “The PPP knows that it does not live in the hearts of the people, so it is fanning ethnic hatred.” PSP President Anis Kaimkhani and party office bearers were also present on the occasion.