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MQM faces a tough challenge

MQM faces a tough challenge | thenewstribe.io

Unlike the popular feeling that MQM is going to have a smooth sailing in Karachi, the party is facing a tough challenge in the local bodies election this time.

In 2005, when MQM’s Mustafa Kamal was elected as the City Nazim, the party was at the height of its political power. It was an integral part of the federal government. If it had withdrawn its support, the PML-Q-led coalition — managed by the military regime of General Musharraf — would not have stayed. It got all it wanted.

In Sindh, the MQM’s rule was virtually absolute as Arbab Ghulam Rahim was a mere figurehead. It had the home department as well as the local bodies department.

Its major opponents then were PPP and Jama’at-e-Islami whose Naimatullah Khan had been the City Nazim in the preceding four years. And these two parties managed to win a combined total of more than 60 union councils out of 178 under the old local bodies system.

This time MQM will not only face these two parties but also Tehreek-e-Insaf and Mohajir Qaumi Movement. The party led by Afaq Ahmad has reemerged — it was nowhere in sight in 2005 because of the arrests of its chief and a large number of workers in 2003.

This time it may give the Muttahida tough time in 10 to 15 union councils in some very important areas with concentration of Urdu-speaking population such as Landhi, Malir, Korangi, Shah Faisal Colony and Lines Area.

Incumbency is a strong factor in all elections whether they be national, provincial or municipal. The parties that have the power at the provincial level are more likely to win in the local bodies elections.

In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the ruling PTI and Jama’at managed to win in most of the cities. The same happened in Punjab and Sindh where PML-N and PPP clinched majority of the seats.

The PPP was in a very weak position in 2005 as it was sitting on the opposition benches in Sindh Assembly despite being the largest party. Now it is the party ruling the province — it has been ruling this province for over seven years. From 2008 to 2013, it needed the support of Muttahida in centre, so it had to give some departments to it in the province as well. But now it doesn’t need anyone’s support.

So the situation has reversed. This time MQM is on its own. Though it won a number of seats in 2013 general elections, it is neither a part of the central government, nor of the Sindh government because PML-N does not need any party’s support for the federal government and the PPP does not require any partner in Sindh.

The MQM will, of course, win the elections in most of the areas where the population is largely Urdu-speaking, but it will not have a cakewalk.

The PPP is likely to retain the areas that it won in 2005 — the areas with a large population of the Sindhis and the Baloch such as Lyari and Malir.

Moreover, the alliance of Jama’at with the PTI is likely to result in losses for MQM even in those areas where the MQM has remained largely unchallenged since 1987 — the first time it won and swept the elections.

The PTI, which bagged as many as 800,000 votes in Karachi in the 2013 general elections and has one National Assembly and two Sindh Assembly members from the city, has campaigned far more vigorously this time than it did two and a half years ago.

In 2005, Jama’at’s Al-Khidmat group won the elections in some union councils of PECHS and around half of Gulshan Town union councils where the Urdu-speaking population is in majority.

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