HYDERABAD: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement is set to grab the office of vice president of the Cantonment Board Hyderabad (CBH) after winning two more seats reserved for women and minorities in indirect election on Friday.

The latest wins took the number of the party’s seats to eight in the 12 seats of elected councillors who will vote for the vice president.

The MQM’s Rahat Naseem was elected to women’s and Shahid Masih to minority’s seats after defeating the PPP’s Ms Iona and Yunus Sohail. Ten councillors were directly elected. Of them, six belonged to the MQM, three to the PPP and one is independent.

Interestingly, the PPP got one more vote in reserved seats polls, which was apparently cast by the party’s rival independent councillor, Abdul Rehman Pathan, who had defeated the PPP candidate in ward-4.

The vote was a compromise between the two sides in return for disposal of a case lodged against Pathan and his associates under the Anti Terrorism Act (ATA) after a clash.

The number of votes bagged by the candidates laid it bare Pathan had voted for the PPP. He had defeated the PPP’s Mohammad Ibrahim Qureshi in the biggest upset in CBH’s elections held on April 25.

Rehman won by a margin of just nine votes polled him by women after he and his rival were tied at 275 each in men’s polling station.

Asked about reasons behind his capitulation, Pathan said: “It is simple. I cannot vote for the MQM so I voted for PPP. But I haven’t joined the party that’s for sure”. He said that he would work as an independent candidate.

The election result led to a fight between their supporters, culminating in registration of a case against Pathan, Dr Farid Ahmed Shaikh, medical superintendent of the Cantonment Hospital Hyderabad and many others on a complaint lodged by the PPP’s Gohar Khan.

PPP supporters believe the defeat to party candidates in ward-4 and 5 was caused by lacklustre participation of the party’s district president Zahid Bhurgari who was twice elected councillor and MPA from the same area, Pervez Ansari and others who did not take interest in electioneering for the party candidates despite being residents of the area.

Senior workers and Bhurgari’s closest friends like Ilyas Qureshi and Gohar Khan say that Bhurgari preferred his personal relations with Dr Shaikh, who supported Pathan, over party interests. “I can say with confidence that even the names of reserved seat’s candidates of the PPP have been given by Dr Farid Shaikh and not the PPP local leaders,” said Gohar.

Brig Shahid Mehmood, CBH president, administered oath to 10 councillors, whose success has been notified by the Election Commission of Pakistan.

Considering present numbers the MQM is set to grab the vice-president’s seat after edging out PPP from the CBH.

After election of general councillors and reserved seats, an equal number of members (12) will be nominated to the CBH besides its president, taking the total to 25 members.

Until 2003, the CBH was a class-II board as it had a population of over 50,000 but after its population rose to over 100,000 it was defined as class-I board by the federal government thus necessitating creation of more wards.

FIR disposed of

The case filed under sections of ATA lodged against Pathan, Dr Shaikh and others was disposed of by police on May 21 following a compromise between the two sides.

The ATA cases are non-compoundable but when the parties agree to out of court settlement the complainant changes the statement to weaken the FIR to pave the way for its disposal.

In this case, Gohar changed his statement during investigation and gave a different account of the incident, resulting in disposal of the FIR as cancelled class.

Sindh minister and PPP Hyderabad general secretary, Jam Khan Shoro, intervened to settle the dispute after he was approached by Dr Shaikh despite the fact that Sheikh’s family was instrumental in his defeat on polling stations in Saddar in 2013 polls on PS-47 after they supported PTI candidate.

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2015

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