Karachi: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) announced on Sunday that it will hold a sit-in protest at Fawara Chowk near the Karachi Press Club starting February 12. The protest is in opposition to the local body elections in Karachi and Hyderabad. During a meeting with the party’s general workers, Convenor Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui instructed the workers to prepare for the sit-in and stated that they will fight for the cause of Karachi from February 12. He added that the country is at a crucial point and the economy is affecting politics, and it is time to fulfill the promises made to their forefathers.
Siddiqui also announced that the MQM-P will participate in the upcoming by-polls on the nine seats in Karachi and plans to win those seats. The party had boycotted the second phase of the local bodies elections, which took place in seven districts of Sindh, including Karachi and Hyderabad, on January 15. The MQM-P demanded fresh delimitation before the elections, but the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) went ahead with the polls despite the Sindh government’s announcement to delay the elections.
In a press conference, Siddiqui stated that the local body elections had already been rigged, and the party refused to recognize the polls. He added that the election commission failed to fulfill its responsibility to conduct the polls in a transparent manner and that the party protested against this injustice. As a result of the boycott, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) won the majority of the seats, with PPP winning 91 seats and JI securing 85 seats. Other parties such as the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazal (JUI-F), Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), and an independent candidate also won seats in the elections.
