KARACHI The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) on Thursday warned of strong province-wide protest against the ‘atrocities’ being committed against the people of Karachi and said that the MQM-P had left with no option but to take to streets against the Pakistan Peoples Party government and its policies which were ‘anti-Karachiites’ and ‘anti-development’ of the province’s urban centres.

At a protest demonstration held in line with the recently-launched campaign against the Sindh Local Government Amendment Bill 2021 near Gujjar Nullah where anti-encroachment operation had demolished several homes, leaders of the MQM-P called for countrywide awareness movement to build momentum for the rights of Karachi and warned that the existing policies of the provincial government for the country’s business capital would cause suffering to the masses and could lead to a national disaster.

“The PPP has never enjoyed government in urban areas of Sindh and what it’s doing in revenge is creating anti-city policies and isolating the Karachiites,” said the party’s parliamentary leader in the Sindh Assembly Kanwar Naveed Jamil said while addressing the protesters. A large number of people including women and children participated in the protest. Carrying placards and chanting slogans against the Sindh government, they demanded the authorities to restore Karachi rights and power to local bodies’ system.

“The PPP is convinced that since it can’t rule Karachi, Hyderabad or any other city in Sindh, it should deprive them of their basic rights. The leaders of this [PPP] who call themselves champions of democracy are in fact true feudal and treat the people of the province as their bonded labourers. From court to parliament, we have knocked on every door to tell them that our houses are being demolished, our health system is collapsing and our youngsters are being deprived of jobs, but no one listens to us. We have left with no option but to protest.”

He alleged that the jobs reserved for the people of urban Sindh were being doled out to the residents of rural areas on the basis of fake domiciles and permanent residence certificates (PRCs). The state of corruption in the Sindh government, he said, was such that 500 officers involved in the National Accountability cases were in offices reflecting the true face of PPP’s approach of governance and its direct involvement in such practices.

“Under the same corrupt policy, they have decided to elect the mayor through secret balloting,” said Mr Jamil. “They know they can’t win elections or hearts but they can keep people silent or buy them through millions and billions, they have made through corruption. The PPP has attempted to create a replica of the same corrupt system at level of local bodies which it has been operating at provincial level for last 13 years.”

Published in Dawn, December 3rd, 2021