KARACHI: A day after the worst defeat of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan in the Senate elections, Pak Sarzameen Party chairman Mustafa Kamal has claimed both groups of the MQM-P — PIB Colony and Bahadurabad — have been selling the mandate of Karachi as the MQM founder had done during the previous 30 years.

Due to infighting and split in the MQM-P, only one candidate, Dr Farogh Nasim, was elected a senator.

While accusing the Pakistan Peoples Party of ‘horse-trading’, MQM-P leaders had themselves conceded that their over a dozen lawmakers, including five females, did not vote for the party.

In contrast to the MQM-P, the vote bank of the PSP — eight lawmakers who quit their parties to join Mr Kamal but never resigned — in the assembly remained intact as they gave vote to PML-Functional’s Muzaffar Hussain Shah who got elected after securing highest votes (23).

Speaking at a press conference on Sunday at his party headquarters, Pakistan House, Mr Kamal claimed that MQM-P lawmakers sold their votes in the Senate election because their high-up were also “busy in moneymaking”.

He said some MQM-P lawmakers claimed that they did not cast vote for Kamran Tessori under protest. He questioned as to what kind of protest it was that they sold their vote instead of giving it to other candidate Farogh Nasim as a mark of protest.

He claimed that it was nothing surprising that the MQM-P sold the mandate of this city, as their founder Altaf Hussain had been doing so for the past 30 years.

Specifically addressing the Mohajir community, Mr Kamal asked them not to be disappointed because of the prevailing situation as they have the PSP which he said was their only option.

He said Dr Farooq Sattar had been claiming that it was he who managed to foil the planned merger between the MQM and the PSP. “I thanked God that he did so otherwise where I would stand today,” he said, sarcastically.

However, he again invited Dr Sattar and Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, the head of the PIB Colony and Bahadurabad groups of the MQM-P, respectively, to join his party for the welfare of Mohajirs.

He also warned the government not to consider Karachi an orphan territory by making unilateral delimitation of constituencies.

The former Karachi mayor appealed to the Chief Justice of Pakistan to take suo motu notice against injustices with Karachi during the recent population census. “You are taking suo motu on Ajinomoto [Chinese salt] which is a good thing...then take suo motu action on this issue of Karachi as well,” he urged the CJP.

He condemned Karachi Univ­ersity vice chancellor for “giving 400 admissions reserved for the students of Karachi to outsiders”.

He also appealed to the army chief to give amnesty to the Mohajir youths on the same pattern as the government did to the youths in Balochistan.

PSP leaders Anis Kaimkhani, Raza Haroon and Waseem Aftab were also present.

Published in Dawn, March 5th, 2018