KARACHI: Pak Sarzameen Party chairman Mustafa Kamal on Friday demanded the army chief to grant one-time amnesty to Karachi youths similar to the one offered to militants in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa/Fata.

Emphasising the need for the amnesty for Mohajir youths, he said that no one would ever follow the wrong path if the army chief, Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa, accepted his demand.

Mr Kamal was speaking at a workers’ convention at the KMC ground in PIB Colony — a venue often chosen by Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan leader Dr Farooq Sattar.

The event was held not only to mark the second anniversary of Mr Kamal’s return to politics but also to send a message to the PSP’s political rivals that it can hold successful events even in their home turf.

Carrying national flags and shouting slogans, PSP workers took out rallies from their respective areas to reach the venue in PIB Colony. The venue was packed to capacity before the event formally began.

Mr Kamal challenged Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui and Dr Sattar — the respective heads of the Bahadurabad and PIB factions of the MQM-P — to come before the entire nation and media and convince him that their ideology was right. “I will disband the PSP [if they are right].”

Lashing out at the MQM factions, he questioned what they had done for the Mohajirs during the past 30 years. “Should Mohajirs ignore the fact that Karachi has one university and their kids are not even getting admission there? Should they forget that their city has been turned into ruins?

“I have no personal enmity with it but the MQM is a blot on the face of my nation,” he said, adding: “The Mohajirs will continue to face humiliation until the MQM is eliminated.”

He said that those who said that PSP had divided the Mohajir vote bank should see for themselves that their mandate was still on sale for the Pakistan Peoples Party and Pakistan Muslim League.

Mr Kamal said that his politics was not aimed at getting “seats”.

PSP leaders Raza Haroon, Dr Sagheer Ahmed, Anis Ahmed Advocate and others also spoke.

They strongly criticised both groups of the MQM-P and alleged that those who could not even lift the garbage of Karachi were busy in selling the people’s mandate for their own sake.

They said that Mr Kamal was the “only hope” of the people of urban areas of Sindh.

Mr Kamal along with PSP president Anis Kaimkhani had returned to the country on March 3, 2016. In a press conference that day, he announced quitting the MQM and forming a new party, heaped scorn on MQM supremo Altaf Hussain and hurled serious allegations against him.

Published in Dawn, March 3rd, 2018