Sindh Home Minister Zulfiqar Mirzas removal could turn out to be a Pyrrhic victory for the MQM. The ethnic outfit is soon going to find that little has changed with his surrender of the home ministry while there is more hostility towards it in the PPP ranks and file. Mirza might have been suffering from an incurable foot-in-mouth disease but his sentiments vis–vis MQM are widely shared by the rest of the PPP Sindh legislators. It was to pacify them that Sharjeel Memon was inducted in the provincial cabinet on the very day Mirza was sent home. Memon is known to be a staunch supporter of the former home minister.
The honeymoon between the PPP and MQM in Sindh was over within months of the latters induction in the cabinet. What gradually emerged was a rivalry of a most vicious kind. PPP ensured that levers of political power remained in its own hands. Besides appointing PPP leaders as chief minister and senior minister, the party also retained the interior and local bodies ministries in its own hands. The portfolios were needed to ensure the extension of PPPs political influence in urban areas of Sindh. This gradually brought the MQM, which was also eyeing some of these ministries, into conflict with the PPP.
What is at stake for both parties is the control of the province. Local bodies assume special importance in the pursuit. These have invariably played a vital role in the outcome of the general elections. The local bodies have huge funds at their disposal. Karachi City District government alone had a budget of Rs 45 billion in 2010. Local bodies have large transport resources and other facilities that can be of immense help to the party they support. Thus, the elections to be held two years hence are tied to the LB polls. The more the general elections draw nearer, the fiercer becomes the competition.
While differences between the coalition partners surfaced within months of joining hands, they were to begin to peak in 2010. This in fact coincided with the wrapping up of the district government system. The announcement by Sindh Chief Minister to hand over the KWSB chair to PPP local bodies minister Agha Siraj Durrani met with noisy protests and Altaf Hussain called for an immediate cancellation of the appointment which was done shortly after.
The MQM wants the retention of the Musharraf-era district government system with few changes but the PPP wants to replace it with the commissionerate system which existed prior to the devolution plan. The issue remains a bone of contention between the two parties. Drafts have been exchanged for more than a year without any let up to the controversy. Thus the elections for the local bodies promised by Zardari for 2011 are still nowhere in sight leaving a desperate MQM fuming and fretting.
Equally coveted by the MQM is the home ministry which controls provincial intelligence organisations and police besides having the powers to seek the deployment of paramilitary units like the FC. This provides the holder of the office a powerful lever before and during the elections. Agencies under home ministry can be used to pressurise political parties and to win over the loyalties of opponents.
To sum up, at the bottom the PPP-MQM dispute in Sindh are the two ministries of local bodies and interior.
The MQM knows only one way to resolve political differences which is by taking recourse to violence. Peoples Amn Committee is Mirzas answer to MQMs musclemen. Targeted killings have thus multiplied. Collection of extortion money called bhatta was originally introduced by the MQM on the excuse that being a middle class party it could not take part in politics through membership fees alone. Amn Committee members who happen to be financially worse off than the MQM men think they too can collect funds in a similar way. This has added a financial dimension to the rivalry.
Targeted killings and bhatta are byproducts of the rivalry for the control of urban Sindh. With the elections drawing near, the rivalry is going to increase rather than end. The PPP needs MQM because if it was to abandon the coalition, the government would not be able to have a majority in case of a no-confidence move. Unless the MQM stops pressing the PPP further, the latter would have no option but to say goodbye to it. In that case, the PPP would have to seek alliance with the PML(Q) which alone is in a position to bail it out.
The writer is a former academic and a political analyst.
