KARACHI: Lawmakers belonging to the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan ended their sit-in on Saturday evening, but warned that the party’s protest drive against the provincial government for “neglecting Karachi” in the budget would soon resume with a vengeance.

The MQM-P’s sit-in and boycott of the ongoing assembly session continued for the third day. The party said it was protesting against “corrupt and racist government of the Pakistan Peoples Party in Sindh”.

Speaking at a press briefing at the sit-in camp in front of the Sindh Assembly building, senior MQM leader Kanwar Naveed Jameel said the sit-in primarily aimed at awakening a realisation that Karachi contributed up to 95 per cent of Sindh’s revenue and it should be given share in accordance with the same proportion.

“We have informed a PPP delegation that we will not allow the Sindh government to continue doing injustices with the urban areas of the province and we will continue our struggle till all cities of Sindh get their due rights,” he added.

‘We will ask the people to join our protest campaign in which our elected representatives and workers will take part in a vigorous manner’

He said the protest campaign would be spread to every nook and cranny of Karachi as well as other urban centres after the end of global coronavirus pandemic.

“We will ask the people to join our protest campaign in which our elected representatives, office-bearers and workers will take part in a vigorous manner,” said Mr Jameel, who is also the parliamentary party head of the MQM-P.

Criticising the PPP government in Sindh, the MQM leader said that Karachi lacked basic infrastructure, sewerage, transport, health and education system and despite this it was the height of insensitivity that the Sindh government did not allocate any amount for Karachi in budget 2020-21.

He said the Sindh government had not taken effective measures to deal with the coronavirus pandemic.

The MQM leader announced ending the sit-in and vowed to resume it again after a short break.

On Thursday, the MQM lawmakers had boycotted the assembly session and staged a sit-in outside the Sindh Assembly building in protest over the non-allocation of funds for the development of Karachi.

They said that the Sindh government collected Rs16,481 billion from Karachi during the past 12 years and it had spent just around Rs150bn on the development of the metropolis, which clearly suggest that the PPP-led government had deliberately been victimising the people of Karachi and other urban areas for over a decade.

Published in Dawn, June 28th, 2020