Not the best way to get rid of MQM
First SSP Malir publicly demanded a ban on the MQM, a highly unusual move by a government servant. The SSP was followed by Balochistan Assembly which passed a resolution calling for slapping a ban on the MQM. Media reports tell of attempts being afoot to get similar resolutions passed from other provincial assemblies. There is also a frenzied campaign in social media in support of the demand.
Fortunately, there are saner voices also. Both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have strongly disapproved the remarks by MQM chief but have welcomed the apology tendered by Altaf Hussain. Khurshid Shah has gone a step further by suggesting that after the apology the matter should have been dropped. There are other parties, however, which mistakenly believe that restrictions on the MQM would create a space for them in urban Sindh. They would soon find that they were sadly mistaken.
What sustains a political party in public is its standing among its constituency. Propaganda by state machinery or by opponents cannot alone make a party unpopular. The media trial of the MQM conducted over several months has not made any adverse impact on the party’s following as NA-246 polls amply prove. Unless other political parties prove their worth and are seen by the urban population of Sindh as viable alternatives, MQM’s influence will remain unaffected. Any action against the party leadership would be resented. This is what happened in the case of NAP which was banned by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1975. The party leaders were arrested and the party’s assets were seized. The action did not lead to any decline in NAP’s vote bank let alone eliminate the party altogether. The NAP re-emerged in 1986 by renaming itself ANP. The PPP which had banned the party had to accept it as a coalition partner in 1988 and subsequently by PML-N, both in the then NWFP and at the Centre till 1998. A hunch for shortcuts can lead to unintended consequences.