KARACHI: In three of the eight cantonment boards in Sindh, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, which emerged as the single-largest party in the Saturday local government elections, is set to bring its vice presidents, it turned out on Sunday.

There are eight cantonment boards in Sindh — one each in Hyderabad and Pano Aqil and six in Karachi — and elections were held for 44 general councillors in as many wards.

Major parties, including the Pakistan Peoples Party, the MQM, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf, the Jamaat-i-Islami and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz had contested the election.

Except for eight seats won by independent candidates, the MQM got 19 seats followed by the PPP which grabbed six seats, the PML-N five, the PTI four and the JI got two seats.

Each cantonment board is headed by a president, who is an official of the armed forces. The general councillors would elect members on seats reserved for women, labour and minorities and one person from among themselves as the cantonment’s vice president.

Also read: PML-N, PTI, MQM prevail in strongholds

The MQM can bring its vice presidents in Cantonment Board Hyderabad (CBH), Cantonment Board Faisal (CBF) and Cantonment Board Karachi (CBK) without having an alliance with any party.

In the CBH, the MQM enjoyed a comfortable majority as it got six out of 10 seats of general councillors. The PPP got three seats and remaining one seat was won by an independent candidate.

Similarly, in the CBF, the MQM won seven out of 10 seats. Remaining three seats were bagged by the PML-N.

Of the five seats of general councillors in the CBK, the MQM got three seats and the remaining two seats were bagged by independent candidates.

However, there would be an interesting contest for the slot of vice president of the Cantonment Board Clifton (CBC).

Of the 10 seats in the CBC, the PTI got four, the PPP three, the MQM two and one seat was secured by a JI candidate.

PTI leader Ali Zaidi told Dawn that the JI candidate would support his party for the slot of CBC’s vice president.

When asked whether his party would seek support from the PPP or the MQM, he said: “We have a meeting tomorrow but it is very difficult to go with the MQM.”

Senior PPP leader Saeed Ghani told Dawn that his party was busy in the Lyari public meeting and from tomorrow (Monday) it would drawn its plan to talk to other parties. “We can talk to everyone, but holding dialogue with the PTI is a little difficult,” he said when asked whether his party would seek two MQM votes in the CBC.

Similar views were shared by MQM leader Aminul Haq, who said that his part would talk to any other party as “nothing is final in politics”.

In the Cantonment Board Malir, there are three seats of general councillors which were won by the MQM, the PML-N and an independent candidate.

A JI candidate, who returned unopposed, and a PML-N candidate won the two seats in the Cantonment Board Korangi.

No political party contested the election in the Cantonment Board Manora and two independent candidates emerged victorious from there.

Two independent candidates had been returned unopposed to as many seats of the Cantonment Board Pano Aqil.

Published in Dawn, April 27th, 2015

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