KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party’s camps set up in different areas of Lyari were forcefully shut down on Friday after an elders committee, allegedly backed by the banned Peoples Amn Committee, was snubbed by PPP leaders in a meeting at Bilawal House a day earlier.

In the morning, a statement of the PAC leader in hiding published in a local daily asked people not to attend the PPP public meeting near the Quaid-i-Azam mausoleum and graffiti appeared on walls across Lyari demanding ‘withdrawal of red warrants for the leaders of Lyari’.

The chairperson of the elders’ committee (Buzurg committee), which according to sources work as a mouthpiece for the PAC, Syed Nooran Shah, said PAC leader Uzair Baloch called off Lyari’s participation in the rally after the meeting between the activists and the officials at Bilawal House did not go as planned.

Speaking to Dawn over the phone, Mr Shah said: “On Thursday, a group of members of our committee, including women, went to Bilawal House. We wanted to discuss two things: end to extrajudicial killings of our workers in Lyari and withdrawal of red warrants issued for the arrest of our leaders so that they can come back to the country and continue political activity in the area.”

According to him, they were made to sit for four hours, “and when it became clear that nobody was interested in meeting us, we left”.

Though people were warned against attending the PPP rally by the PAC leader’s statement appeared in a daily known as Jaanbaz in the area, those who had their doubts about the news were sent a firm reminder when around noon, camps set up by the PPP in Nayabad, Khadda Market, Chakiwara (which is considered a political junction) and Lyari General Hospital were forcefully shut down by unidentified men.

By afternoon, shops started to close in Nayabad, Cheel Chowk and Aath Chowk followed by the deployment of Rangers and police mobile vans in various entry points across Lyari.

Mr Shah said that apart from Lyari, “Uzair has asked his workers in Mawach Goth, Malir, Keamari and Mauripur to stay away from the rally”.

The message was soon followed through as one of the camps at Mawach Goth was attacked by gunmen allegedly supported by the PAC.

He, however, added: “If in case a deal is agreed upon between the leaders, they might ask Lyariites to attend the rally but otherwise it seems difficult. They [PPP leaders] have to understand that emotions alone won’t help them, they have to introduce sustainable development in the area.”

According to sources, the role of the elders’ committee is dubious. They worked as “a mouthpiece for the PAC as they couldn’t bring about a ceasefire between the warring gangs when it was needed the most,” said the sources.

Banished from the area, PPP activists were seen camping right outside the main gate of Civil Hospital Karachi playing party music.

The current situation is quite similar to the one in the beginning of April 2012, when after the killing of two close aides of Uzair Baloch in an encounter by police, the PAC leader stopped people from attending former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s death anniversary being held in Garhi Khuda Bakhsh.

It was followed by a police operation in Lyari which continued for six days before it was stopped halfway on the orders of former interior minister Rehman Malik during a meeting at the Central Police Office.

As a result of that, the PPP had to nominate ministers handpicked by the PAC leader for the national and provincial assemblies during the general elections of 2013.

A day back, Bilawal’s visit to Nayabad failed to create the kind of stir it would have had, according to Muneeb Baloch, a weekly magazine editor in Lyari.

“Many of us didn’t know about his visit until it was over. People in Lyari never needed to be forced to attend a PPP gathering, they attended voluntarily. However, if a deal is struck between the party leaders and the PAC, there’s still hope that people might attend.”

Published in Dawn, October 18th, 2014