Seventy-year-old Mohammad Solangi stands at the entrance to the haveli from which his murshid is about to appear. “I have just come to see him and not for any work,” Mr Solangi smiles. Soon his murshid — Makhdoom Amin Fahim — emerges to board his grey Prado. Another mureed almost stoops to genuflect but the murshid lifts him back up.
The 18th custodian of the shrine of Makhdoom Sarwar Nooh, Mr Fahim is the sitting president of the Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians. Hala, now a taluka, where the PPP was founded by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto back in the 1960s, is a home of handicrafts; the Makhdooms have been returning from this constituency easily since 1977, barring the 1985 elections which the PPP boycotted. They rule their area spiritually and politically unchallenged.
His father was elected in the 1977 polls, while Mr Fahim himself was elected uncontested in the 1993 general elections. Until the 2008 polls he won by big margins.
Does he feel uncomfortable this time after being challenged by trusted friends who have switched sides?
“The PPP is a big political party,” comes the soft-spoken reply. “Many have joined and left it but whoever left, they lost their worth.”
The Makhdooms are for the first time facing serious resistance in their home constituency after close friends Ali Ahmed Nizamani and Rais Nazir Rahu ditched them last year to form the Awami Ittehad Matiari. Eventually, they became part of the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional.
“We say Makhdoom sahib should disclose the statistics of the development carried out in Matiari and the jobs given to people,” argues Ali Ahmed Nizamani. “Even Makhdoom Rafik Zaman assured us that he will be working for us against Makhdoom Jamiluzzaman on PS-44, but then he was awarded a ticket by the PPP.”
The contest in Matiari is evenly poised on three seats: Nazir Rahu is a PML-F candidate against Mr Fahim’s son Makhdoom Jamiluzzaman on PS-43 and the PML-F’s Mohammad Ali Shah Jamote is fighting against Mr Fahim’s younger brother, Makhdoom Rafik Zaman, on PS-44. Mr Jamote’s brother, Taimoor Shah, though inexperienced, got a substantial 20,090 votes as the PML-F candidate in 2008 against Mr Fahim on PS-44.
Mr Fahim’s personal involvement in the campaign shows that he is not taking things lying down. He feels comfortable on NA-218 against Abdul Razzaque Memon, his former coordinator for Matiari and now backed by the 10-party alliance. The other candidates are the PPP-SB’s Peeral Majidano and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s Ghulam Shabbir Shah, but they are likely to just be vote spoilers.
Matiari is a rural district on the left bank of the Indus River and is known for cotton and sugarcane production. It is populated by the Memon, Jamali, Rahu, Kaka, Khoso, Abro and Solangi communities. The district was hit badly in the 2011 torrential monsoon rains.
Villages remained submerged for a long time. The local people say that the Makhdooms did not give the kind of response expected of them at that time.
Then, they say, jobs were not given to deserving ones. People even staged a protest against the district PPP president and MPA from Matiari, Ameer Ali Shah Hashmi. “One close associate of Amin Fahim got five jobs for himself and his four brothers,” says a local resident. “The disenchantment is very obvious. But then, election dynamics always work differently.”
Electoral victory for the Makhdooms has always been unassailable. Had there been no formation of a local alliance by the Rahus, Memons and Nizamanis, along with the PML-F’s Mohammad Ali Shah Jamote, elections would have been a formality again. But now, there is new colour to the contest.
“I don’t know why the Makhdooms treated me like this,” says Mr Rahu. “I didn’t get even a single job for my family and even development works did not happen in my area. There was only a road scheme which I got through my personal connection [with ManzoorWassan].”
Mr Rahu and Mr Nizamani had a long association with not only just the Makhdooms but the PPP. The former is one of the personal friends of President Asif Ali Zardari and has family relations with him. Yet even the president could not persuade them to give up their opposition to Mr Fahim. Initially, Messrs Rahu and Nizamani claimed that they would not leave the PPP and would contest independently against the Makhdooms. But then they joined the PML-F.
Mr Nizamani himself now faces political divisions within his family. Mr Fahim is to attend a reception to be hosted by the brother-in-law of Ali Ahmed Nizamani, Wasim Nizamani. Likewise, Mr Fahim attended a reception in the bungalow of Mushtaq Rahu, a cousin of Nazir Rahu, on Sunday night. It must have upset Nazir Rahu since the division will divide his votes in New Saeedabad taluka — otherwise Mr Rahu’s home turf. According to a journalist who is close to Mr Rahu, Mushtaq Rahu’s support is a healthy development for the Makhdooms and will impact Mr Rahu’s work seriously.
Mr Fahim has some complaints against his friends too. “I used to refer local issues to Mr Rahu, which indicates my trust in him,” he says. “I was the first to call to invite him and discuss how to go into the elections. But he avoided me and then I heard of the formation of the group against me.” But, says Mr Fahim, “things can be settled as nobody is perfect and there can be mistakes.”
Unusually, the elder Makhdoom is now personally leading the election campaign for himself, his son and brother, trying to neutralise the effect of the defections. “If the Makhdooms emerge victorious this time, they will remain unconquered for a long time,” comments a Matiari journalist.
On Sunday, Mr Fahim went to the residence of Makhdoom Fazal Hussain — his distant relative — who couldn’t win in the 2002 polls despite having a PPP ticket because Makhdoom Rafik Zaman was at loggerheads within. Mr Hussain is said to have received a call from the president to back the Makhdooms.
“I think people don’t appreciate three PPP tickets being given to the Makhdooms,” remarks Muharram Raz, a local television reporter. “One of them could have been given to Mr Rahu to keep him in the party. I believe that a serious contest awaits the Makhdooms on May 11.”According to Mr Raz, the JUI-F has its vote bank and the PML-F is backed by a 10-party alliance; Fazal Hussain’s support for the PPP won’t benefit the Makhdooms much.
The embarrassment the Makhdooms are facing is largely due to the lack of coordination, an indifferent attitude and arrogance on the part of those who serve as contacts between the Makhdooms and the locals. They have been maintaining a distance from the electorate. People’s ire is targeted mainly at Makhdoom Jamiluzzaman and his coordinator.
The Makhdooms are feeling the heat and Makhdoom Rafik Zaman is working in Matiari around the clock. Rafik Zaman has been the district nazim of undivided Hyderabad, and was previously elected on Hala’s provincial assembly seat (PS-35) as well in 1990. He was also elected from PS-36 in 1988 to become the Sindh home minister and 1997. Makhdoom Jamil was elected in the 2002 and 2008 polls.
Besides the complex nature of Matiari’s politics, there is another interesting factor. A former inspector general of the Sindh police and a current deputy inspector general of the police have influence in different pockets. The former IG supports the Makhdooms while the DIG backs the PML-F on account of his community connection. The DIG’s brother, who is with the PML-F, was recently incarcerated in a murder case concerning the death of a PPP activist in a brawl. The DIG himself was said to have been instrumental in the formation of the Awami Ittehad Matiari.