POST-Aug 22 fiasco, followed by Dr Farooq Sattar’s presser wherein he disowned Altaf Hussain’s tirade against the state and a never-ending coverage of Karachi events on a 24/7 basis, I called a friend in the metropolis and asked why the establishment was not letting Dr Sattar to steer the party out of the crisis without creating further chaos in the city.

He laughed at my ignorance and said that was exactly what the establishment had been doing.

He asked me how I would feel when a politician like Dr Sattar was insulted, pushed around under the watchful eyes of dozens of cameras and political workers and leaders paraded blindfolded in courtyards as common criminals, bulldozing MQM offices, regardless of a legal or an illegal land, without giving any notice for evacuation. Were these actions not good enough to support Dr Sattar, using as a victim card to keep the vote bank intact?

He did point to the discrimination being talked off on Karachi streets and on social media — why no action against Syed Munawar Hasan who once declared Pakistan soldiers sacrificing their lives while fighting terrorists as ‘merely dead men’, or against Maulvi Abdul Aziz who issued a fatwa banning the ‘namaz-i-janaza’ of martyrs?

How come attackers on the PTV’s Islamabad station and on Geo offices were given a free hand (despite FIRs); why was no one punished for Model Town killings? Why a crime committed in Islamabad or in Lahore is treated differently from the one in Karachi?

Masood Khan
Jubail, Saudi Arabia

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All MQM detainees, as seen on TV channels, are declaring themselves thorough-bred Pakistanis and raising pro-Pakistan Zindabad slogans on their way to and from courts.

Only a day or two ago they were assuring Altaf of their unflinching loyalty by howling in unison, ‘Pakistan Murdabad’ and raiding media houses to destroy them.

How come so soon, and suddenly a change of heart? To me, it is all a farce being paraded on the advice of their lawyers to produce it later as an evidence in the courts in their defence for being pro-Pakistanis.

If they are really so sincere to Pakistan, they must prove their loyalty by denouncing AH as traitor and raising slogans of Altaf Hussain Murdabad, which should be telecast by all TV channels repeatedly for at least three days.

Moreover, the MQM’s 190 illegal offices in Karachi and another 80 in Hyderabad have been sealed by Law-enforcement agencies. For how long have these offices been there? For decades. Didn’t the Sindh governments — previous and present — know of it? Where were the city mayors to have allowed the MQM to occupy illegally and forcefully plots and parks for their offices allegedly used for criminal activity?

Again, didn’t some of the MQM bigwigs have huge wedding halls illegally and forcefully constructed upon large vacant plots in some of the posh areas of Karachi and which were demolished only some time back?

And now our political parties, just to serve their own interests, have the cheek to talk of giving these very criminals another chance and space to negotiate with!

Col(r) Riaz Jafri
Rawalpindi

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2016