‘Masses don’t care what’s going on in courts’

The poverty-stricken masses of the country have nothing to do with the issues or cases being heard in the courts, said Federal Ports and Shipping Minister Senator Babar Khan Ghauri on Thursday.
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader was speaking at the Karachi Port Trust where he announced the regularisation of around 223 daily wagers and contractual employees.
Ghauri said the inflation-stricken people are the least concerned about which cases are being heard in the courts or what issues are in the limelight at present. “All they care about is the poverty or the recent petroleum price hike, against which we protested in the parliament on Wednesday,” he added.
Expressing concern over the rising incidents of targeted killings in Karachi, he said that the Rangers and police have failed to check the menace.
The minister said the MQM would contest the forthcoming senate elections from all categories and is trying to get its senator hopefuls elected from the Sindh Assembly unopposed in the reconciliatory spirit prevailing.
Ghauri said that over 350 billion rupees of public money was going to waste through the loss-making government institutions like Pakistan International Airlines, Pakistan Railways and Pakistan Steel Mills among others. “The huge sum can be used for the people’s development,” he said.
About his party’s proposed 20th Constitutional Amendment, the senator said that some people were deliberately creating issues to politicise a simple matter.
Reiterating his party’s stance on new provinces, he questioned what is wrong if Bahawalpur and Saraiki belt are made new provinces in line with the wishes of the people of these areas.
Rejecting the nationalists’ concern about the 20th amendment that the MQM-backed proposal would weaken the provinces, the MQM leader said that the constitution already includes an article protecting the provinces’ right to decide their fate in terms of the creation of new federating units.
He termed the death of over a hundred people in Punjab as deplorable, saying some unscrupulous drug inspectors were killing their own countrymen for small worldly gains. “Sri Lanka has banned import of our medicines due to this issue,” he said.
Saying the MQM is ready for early or late general elections, the federal minister, however, remained tight-lipped when asked to comment on the Supreme Court’s decision in the prime minister’s contempt case.