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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Background on the MQM |
| 2004-06-11 |
| Karachi’s ruling party and the grouping most symapthetic to America The MQM was the dream of a few Marxist scholars such as Rais Amrohvi, Mohammed Taqi, John Ailia and Shahanshah Hussain to establish an organization that could protect the rights of immigrants who chose Pakistan over remaining in India when the sub-continent was partitioned from British India in 1947. The All Pakistan Mohajir Student Organization (APMSO) was the initial reality of the dream. It became established on campuses in Karachi, and allied itself with the left-wing Progressive Student Alliance. However, the Islami Jamiat-i-Talaba, which was ideologically allied with the Jamaat-i-Islami and which had been the main force on Karachi campuses, expelled the APMSO. As a result, its founder Altaf Hussain left his studies and went to the US, where he drove a taxi to earn a living. At this time in the 1980s, the honeymoon between the Jamaat-i-Islami and military ruler General Zia ul-Haq was over, and they developed differences on several national political issues. The sector commander of the ISI persuaded Altaf Hussain to return to Karachi and take on the Jamaat-i-Islami. Altaf held big rallies and spoke against Punjabis and Pashtuns living in Karachi. In 1986, a bus driver who happened to be a Pashtun killed a college girl who was a member of a family that had migrated from India. The incident was immediately turned into a riot. The MQM was by now close to many bigwigs in the underworld - it still is - and they had several Pashtuns killed. Pashtuns retaliated in kind, and more. Altaf then initiated a drive to sell televisions and video recorders, the proceeds from which he used to purchase arms and ammunition. MQM activists now numbered thousands, and they roamed all over Karachi with AK-47 assault rifles and other sophisticated arms. Later years saw the MQM turn against Sindhis as well as Pashtuns and Punjabis. Killings and strikes were the order of the day for Karachi. In 1988, the MQM won national and provincial assembly elections, marking the all-out defeat to the Jamaat-i-Islami, knocking it from its only stronghold in the country. In the early 1990s the MQM was a part of Nawaz Sharif’s coalition government when its vice president, Saleem Shehzad, now in exile in London, kidnapped an army major, stripped him and beat him like a dog. As a result, the first army operation was conducted against the MQM. However, Altaf fled to the United Kingdom before it began, and he now holds a British passport. A second operation was subsequently launched against the MQM, commanded by a former interior minister in the PPP government, retired Major-General Naseerullah Baber. This exposed extensive MQM torture cells and "no-go areas" in Karachi. Scores of MQM activists were killed in extrajudicial killings by the police. After Musharraf took over in 1999 in a coup, he helped resolve differences with the MQM, and now it is a partner in the Sindh provincial government, as well as in the federal government. Yet it often remains critical of the establishment, and has the ability to raise rabble on the streets or call for citywide strikes at the drop of a hat. Because of its declared secular nature, the US has traditionally been closer to the MQM than any other party in Pakistan. Over the years, thousands of its activists have been given asylum in the US, where the MQM has a powerful bureau. After September 11, the United States identified even more with the MQM as it was the only party in Pakistan that widely mourned the attacks on the US, openly condemned the Taliban and al-Qaeda, and launched a powerful campaign in support of the US attack on Afghanistan. Latterly, the MQM has been the only party to support the military’s intervention in the tribal areas. Visits by US diplomats to MQM offices in Karachi have - and continue to be - commonplace. Asia Times Online sources say that only US diplomatic intervention stopped Musharraf from taking strong action against the MQM after he received the report on the recent unrest in which the MQM was implicated. Washington indeed has a powerful southern ally in Pakistan. |
| Posted by:Paul Moloney |