The Hyderabad Comeback

KARACHI: An organized campaign coupled with boycott from the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) over unjust delimitations of several areas helped the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) register a thumping victory in Hyderabad this week.

The PPP’s big victory in the second largest city of Sindh province will allow it to bring its own mayor after quite some time.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), which is ranked as the second most popular party in Hyderabad also suffered due to the low turn out and could not make a telling impact in the polls while some other religious parties, too, fell prey to the wrong delimitations.

Hyderabad is divided into nine town municipal corporations including Nerun Kot, Mian Sarfaraz, Paretabad, Sachal Sarmast, Shah Latif, Hussainabad, Qasimabad, Tando Fazal and Tandojam.

Barring MQM-P, a number of candidates contested the LGEs of 160 union committees of Hyderabad district where PPP clinched over 90 out of a total of 160 union committees (UCs) seats and PTI secured around 39 seats to finish second.

Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) obtained just two seats while Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) got one seat as per the provisional result list issued by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

Earlier, MQM-P had fielded its 88 candidates in the seven UCs out of a total of nine, but it later decided to boycott the polls at the eleventh hour because of serious reservations about the wrong delimitations and other issues.

It may be mentioned here that the PPP managed to bag 26 unopposed seats a day before the LG polls, on Jan 14.

The MQM-P’s boycott dented the turnout of the voters and long queues of voters were only seen in the Sindhi-speaking dominated areas like Qasimabad, Nerun Kot, Hussainabad and other parts of the district and majority of towns of Hyderabad were with the low turnout.

However, the LGEs were held in a peaceful way except for a few reports about some scuffles and violence in Sarfaraz town and other towns.

“MQM-P’s boycott has not impacted the PPP’s vote-bank at all. The JI could have benefited from the boycott but could not. PPP swept the LGEs in Karachi and Hyderabad as its MPAs and local leaders worked hard and also campaigned non-stop in the Urdu-speaking localities as well,” Political analyst Barrister Zamir Ahmed Ghumro said.

He said a majority of people appreciated the PPP because of its democratic attitude and the way it always strived to protect the rights of women and minorities while discouraging extremism at all levels.  He said no other political parties have such democratic values like the PPP.

“We have got votes from Urdu-speaking areas only but Sindhi people voted for PPP only while PPP also obtained votes of urdu-speaking people partially. Eight to 10 UCs’ results remain disputed on account of complaints following rigging and violent incidents,” PTI Hyderabad’s Divisional senior vice president Dr Mustansar Billa said.

PTI emerged as an Urdu-speaking party in Hyderabad while Sindhi people rejected Imran Khan’s party.  At the same time, PTI adopted a strange strategy in Karachi where it fielded Pathan candidates and therefore the Urdu-speaking people rejected PTI in Karachi there.