Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah on Friday urged provincial lawmakers of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) to respect their party’s mandate for the sake of democracy and to return to the Sindh Assembly.
Speaking to the media after visiting the mausoleum of Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah in Karachi, the chief minister said that the Sindh government will not accept resignations by the MQM’s provincial lawmakers as long as the federal government does not accept them.
“The MQM should respect its mandate for the sake of democracy and return to the assembly,” he said.
The MQM resigned from all its seats in the Senate, National Assembly and Sindh Assembly on Wednesday in protest against what they describe as a campaign of victimization against them in the ongoing operation in Karachi.
The party, which dominates politics in Pakistan’s largest city Karachi, says it has been unfairly targeted in the police and paramilitary crackdown on violence in the city, the Sindh provincial capital.
