KARACHI, Dec 7: The Pakistan People’s Party has questioned the neutrality of the provincial caretaker government by accusing several of its members and their subordinates of actively assisting their favourite candidates in the electioneering.
A central leader and former senator of PPP, Taj Haider, who heads the newly-set up anti-rigging cell of his party, alleged on Friday that caretaker Minister for Education Shujaat Ali Baig had been campaigning for his wife, Khush Bakht Shujaat, an MQM candidate for NA-250 (Karachi ) constituency.
“The minister is seen campaigning for her along with officials of his department, he claimed pointing out that it happened to be the education department that had spared bulk of its staff for election duties. Mr Haider also alleged that “strong arm tactics and record rigging on the part of the MQM had been seen in the by-election for the same constituency last year.” He recalled that PPP candidate Nafees Siddiqui had been assaulted and his car smashed in the election when he tried to seek the NIC of the person who was officiating as presiding officer at a polling station. Mr Haider claimed the attackers belonged to the MQM.
The PPP cell has accused another caretaker minister, Ghulam Rasool Unar, of continuing to take good care of the election campaign of his nephew, Abdul Hafeez Unar, in PS-27 (Nawabshah) constituency. “His PPP rival, Ghulam Qadir Chandio, had moved an application to the provincial election commission and was assured of suitable action but even the DRO concerned had not yet received any instructions in this regard from the authorities,” it said.
The cell also claimed that no less than 3,000 “blank” appointments letters for primary teachers were supplied to the district government in Ghotki district where the EDO had been recruiting teachers.
It accused the Mehar group of having launched an “employment abroad racket” and holding interviews to trap hundreds of people seeking jobs in the Middle East. It further alleged that senior intelligence officials were organising meetings for reconciliation between the rival Mehar and Lund groups in the district.
In Badin, more than 1,000 letters for the appointment of primary teachers had been sent to the district government and distributed by PML-Q candidates, it claimed.
The PPP cell said that DCO, DPO and the entire administrative machinery had been in attendance on Dec 4 when the former chief minister, Arbab Ghulam Rahim, campaigned for his party’s candidates in Umarkot. Government vehicles in a large number were seen moving with his motorcade, it added.
PPP’s provincial information secretary Dr Fehmida Mirza told a news conference at the Karachi Press Club on Friday that Ali Bux alias Pappu Shah and his wife, Senator Yasmeen Hussain Shah, did not have a graduation degree and, therefore, be declared ineligible to contest polls.
Ms Mirza gave details of Senator Shah’s academic documents, and said that her date of birth on her NIC and the documents differed. She also produced some documents to support her claim that Pappu Shah’s educational documents were also fake.
PPP’s human rights cell on Friday expressed its grave concern over the growing human rights violations in the country.
Ms Fauzia Wahab, central coordinator of the cell said in a media release that the party’s chairperson, Ms Benazir Bhutto, strongly condemned such incidents and expressed solidarity with the legal fraternity and the journalist community.
According to Ms Fauzia, the Musharraf regime had come down heavily on all segments of society and launched a crackdown on political workers, lawyers, judges, journalists and student activists. The country’s jails stood packed with such detainees, she observed.
The drastic steps taken by the regime on and after Nov 3 had plunged the country into the dark age and the much propagated claim of a forward march to democracy stood exposed, she said, slamming that only those TV channels were being allowed to continue their transmissions which came to the regime’s own terms.