For over six hours, all the major private television channels of Pakistan were either themselves hostage, or their viewers were forced to watch, what was being called a very important press conference.
At the end of the day it was unique in its style with more of comical theatrics than credible content, reminiscent of similar speeches by cult leaders like Charles Manson.
Either all the other major politicians, which include international leaders like Barrack Obama and Manmohan Singh, or our own national politicians like Asif Zardari, Nawaz Sharif, Afsandyar Wali etc are not aware of how to address a widely covered press conference, or Altaf Bhai is not.
These politicians should take some tutorial lessons from the man in London in how to get such undisturbed coverage without any commercial breaks, give veiled threats to Supreme Court and other institutions.
Agreed that the MQM has a legitimate mandate with over 25 MNAs, but so do others, yet they will never be able to get this attention from our media.
Democratic electoral mandates do not give a right to indulge in corruption, extortion, murder and arson, nor to exercise feudal monopolies over territorial control. In any case politics in Pakistan should not be played by foreign nationals sitting in London, who have no stakes, and have sworn oath of loyalty to a foreign country.
MALIK T ALI
Lahore