KARACHI, Aug 12: Various associations of the Memon community have decided to approach President Musharraf for immediate arrest of killers of the five brothers.

Expressing a no-confidence in local police at a joint meeting here on Monday night, the representatives of these associations said that if they didn’t get a positive response from President Musharraf, they would call the Memon business community to stop filing tax returns in protest against the killings of innocent members of the Memon community. They may also give a call for closure of business activities for an indefinite period.

Senior vice-president of All Pakistan Memon Federation (APMF) H.M. Shahzad told Dawn that the federation meeting felt that the city police had failed to nab the killers of a businessman Razzak Tasty, who fell prey to terrorism in Sept 2001. “We were given assurances by the police that they were after the culprits and soon they would be arrested, but with the passage of time, the police appeared to have closed the case file,” he said.

The meeting took a serious notice of killing of the five brothers and expressed dissatisfaction over the police performance. The police had completely failed to maintain law and order in the city and provide protection to the people, they added.

“We will not talk to any police or government official in Karachi. We are trying to establish contact with the office of the president. If we get an appointment, we will meet the president during his next visit to Karachi. We are also ready to proceed to Islamabad to have a meeting with the president,” he said. He informed that a five members committee had been formed to meet the president.

The committee comprises President APMF Farooq Motlani, H.M. Shahzad, Secretary General APMF Aziz Jhangra, APMF civic committee’s chairman Razzak Sangani and Yunus Kasmani, the brother-in-law of the slain brothers.

He said the meeting observed that the Memon community was peace loving and doing business in the city. “We also stage protest within a limit, but the incident was horrible and we want the killers must be arrested,” Mr Shahzad said.

However, the police have still been perplexed to ascertain the motive behind the killings, as they could not find any clue to the killers.

The police alleged that the relatives of the deceased were not extending cooperation with the police to advance investigation process.

A senior police official said that the brother and brother-in-law of the deceased brothers had been approached, but they declined to answer the queries.

However, the sources close to the family said that the police from Anti-Terrorist Wing in Napier, came to see the relatives and they were given all required information.

The police officials said it was a completely blind case and they were about to term it a sectarian terrorism incident, which was perpetrated to sabotage the city peace.

Different police teams, constituted by the police hierarchy, had been trying to take a lead and pulling legs of each others to find the traces of the killers, the inside police sources said.

The teams of the Crime Investigation Department (CID), Anti- Terrorist Wing (ATW), two separate teams of the police Investigation Wing and another of Operations Wing had been investigating the case following their own drawn lines. They had been trying to separately approach the relatives of the slain brothers, which would not only irritate them but the case investigation might also spoil, the sources added.

The sources were of the view that it was not a rational and logical approach to investigate a highly sensitive case. A team, headed by one officer might ascertain the motive and reach the culprits faster than the process being adopted, the sources added.

Five brothers in a Suzuki Hi-roof were shot dead on Jahangir Road No-1, near Baloch Para late night on Aug 9.