Incitement to violence

A hate-speech that elicits unprecedented protest

Altaf Hussain’s hate-speech of May 12 was a spate of threats hurled at just about everyone in the country – be it institutions, political parties, or individuals. No one quite escaped the venom of his excruciatingly painful outburst.

Accusing the establishment for its partisan role, he cautioned: “If you don’t stop playing with fire, it would burn the entire Pakistan down”.

He threatened the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) “to reach a decision with honesty or else they would not be able to find a shelter”.

Warning the workers of another political party who have been protesting the alleged rigging in the May 11 elections at the Teen Talwar Chowk in Karachi, the British national thundered that they should behave or else he could unleash his party workers on them who “would dismember them into pieces with their swords”.

He demanded that if the (allegedly rigged) mandate in the city was not respected, “Karachi should be separated from the rest of the country”.

He threatened that if opposition was not stopped, he would let his followers “act freely on their own. How can I control them and for how long? Altaf Hussain should not be blamed if a war breaks out among the people. Whoever attempted to conduct propaganda will face war”.

When his hate-speech elicited the obvious negative reaction from the public and the media, and the phone lines of the London Metropolitan Police were literally jammed with calls to the British government to initiate proceedings against the Queen’s subject, he came up with another fiery outburst on May 15, this time against the media, more notably its anchorpersons: “If you don’t mend your ways, somebody from the organisation of millions of people might lose his mind. If that person does something bad to one of you, don’t blame the MQM or Altaf Hussain”.

He continued puking venom: “If the MQM ran out of patience, then neither the anchors nor the owners of the media houses would find a place to hide”.

A spokesperson of the London Metropolitan Police confirmed the receipt of ‘floods’ of calls from Pakistan, the UK and elsewhere against Altaf Hussain’s hate-speech. He also said that an investigation (against the MQM chief) was underway”.

The British High Commissioner to Pakistan Adam Thomson also commented on the episode. He confirmed the receipt of complaints, but tried to absolve the government of the UK from any responsibility in the matter saying that “unlike some countries of the world, the British police are fiercely independent of the British government and it is for the British police to investigate allegations of incitement to violence or hatred”.

The High Commissioner, however, conceded that the London Metropolitan Police have been flooded with complaints about (Altaf Hussain’s) remarks. “What we say is that wherever somebody has a concern that hatred or violence is being incited, that one community or another is being turned against others, this should be reported to the police. And I know that they take such allegations very, very seriously indeed”. He further said that “if proved guilty, the MQM chief could face a jail sentence”.

He did not rule out the prospect of handing over Altaf Hussain to Pakistan, but said that, in the absence of a UK-Pakistan Extradition Treaty, it would have to go through the whole process which is complicated: “It does not make it impossible, but it does make it quite difficult”.

Karachi has been a hostage to violent and hateful machinations for over thirty years now, which the MQM and its leadership have unleashed on its hapless people with murderous abandon. The MQM are decidedly the original architects of the phenomena of extortion and murder in Karachi which has been used to perpetuate an environment of fear in the city. Thousands have been tortured and brutally exterminated with blood-soaked pieces of their bodies thrown all over the city in gunny bags. It has let lose a spree of murder ever so often to caution the residents against the prospect of freeing themselves from perpetual enslavement. The threatening demeanour and the foul language used by the MQM leadership leave little to the imagination.

These endless threats have been unduly rewarded by various governments with invitations to the MQM to become partners in ‘democracy’ and dictatorship alike. Quite literally, the MQM has been a part of all provincial governments of Sindh and the federal governments over the last thirty years or so. No principles. No qualms. The extortion must continue. The killing spree should not end.

The governments have been aware of this. The security agencies know of this. The intelligence agencies cannot feign ignorance either. What has the combined might of the state done to undo this harrowing spectre that threatens to dismember the country and advancing self-promoting gory objectives? Encourage them further by inducting them as partners in the governments and awarding them lucrative ministries to add to their illicit earnings? Seek their support to save their failing governments by issuing endless statements acknowledging their contribution to ‘democracy’? Quite simply, it has been a case of unremitting shame.

What was the cause for this latest venomous outburst of the supremo? Quite simply, for the first time since the inception of the MQM, the supporters of another political party were able to break the shackles of fear and go to the polling stations to cast their ballots. So, true to tradition, the MQM literally hijacked the entire election process in connivance with the Returning Officers and other ECP officials who were just too scared to stand up to their murderous tactics. The MQM expects this mandate of fear to be accepted without questioning.

For once, the people are angry. They appear unwilling to surrender their right to choose the leadership of their liking. They are protesting. They want justice. They are demanding re-polling under the army supervision in all constituencies of the city. They want an end of the politics of murder and extortion that has been practised through the last thirty years. They have a right to that and it is the state’s responsibility to ensure it.

There are no two ways about it. The politics of fraud must cease. The people of Karachi want their freedom from fear and violence that they suffered from endlessly – and they must have it. They must also have their freedom to choose the leaders of their liking. The ECP must ensure that. The state must ensure that. It should not be left to the goons of terrorist outfits garbed as political parties to decide the fate of the people of Karachi, and that of Pakistan.

A word for the British High Commissioner: instead of hedging your responsibility in the case of investigating the conduct of one of your citizens, you should advise your government to expedite the enquiry against him. For your added information, the two laws under which he can be tried and punished are the Anti-Terrorism Act 2008 and the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006. Meanwhile, and pending the results of the enquiry, appropriate restrictions should be clamped on his speech so that he would not be able to incite the people of Karachi to violence and hatred. They have had enough of that. It is time for them to move on – towards turning Karachi into the glorious city of lights that it used to be, not too long ago!

The writer is a political analyst. He can be reached at [email protected]