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| Karachi: A history of itâs politics and violence |
| 2004-05-21 |
| EFL Karachi has gone from bad to worse. There is no other way to describe the cityâs woes and its downslide since 1984. Foreigners are generally advised by their governments to âavoid visiting Karachiâ Recently, the Indian cricket team refused to play a Test match here, as did South Africa and New Zealand. A Dutch company, which has been working in Karachi for the past few years, has decided to âpack-upâ and leave. The Dutch companyâs decision came a week before a suicide bomb attack in an imambargah killed 19 people and injured around 80. The suicide bomber has since been identified as a âpolicemanâ. A few days later, 10 people were killed and 20 others injured in an armed attack allegedly involving the activists of Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) and the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). The growing violence threatens to plunge Karachi back to the eighties and early nineties when the city was on fire. MMA is mostly Pashtun based, the PPP is a secular party appealing to Sindhis, and the MQM is the party of Indian migrants to Pakistan. Karachi, the city of 14-million people, has witnessed constant bloodshed since 1984. An estimated 5,000 people have been killed in political, ethnic and sectarian violence. The violence has resulted in sharp decline in foreign and local investment. Many believe the decision to shift the capital to Islamabad from Karachi contributed to an emphasis away from Karachi. Even so Karachi retained it pride of place as the melting pot of Pakistan and as its financial capital. Karachi remained the city of colour and culture till the mid 70s. The city once had some 70 cinema-houses, nightclubs, bars and other entertainment outlets. Today, the city hardly has 10 cinema-houses and, of course, no nightclubs or bars since they were banned by Mr Bhutto in 1977. Over the years the city has also seen a rise in the population of aliens. It started with the Afghan refugees but now includes Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans, Burmese and even some Africans. This has resulted in higher crime rates and slum dwellings. Karachi today houses thousands of slum-cities including Asiaâs biggest slum-city, the Orangi Town. There are some 0.5 million Bengalis, one million Afghans and some 0.5 million other foreign nationals like Burmese, Palestinians, Jordanians etc. Police sources, however, say the aliens are not involved in terrorist attacks, which are mounted by either the locals or Pakistanis from Punjab, Frontier or Hazara. The Baloch and Sindhis are primarily into car-lifting and kidnapping for ransom. Even so, some intelligence officials believe hired killers could possibly be drawn from among the aliens. These foreigners make a fertile recruiting ground for Jihadis, especially Laskar-e-Taiba, allowing them to extend their reach to countries like Burma and Bangladesh that have little Pakistani presence. Karachi has been caught in the grip of sectarian violence since the early days of former military ruler General Zia-ul-Haq. In 1978, some 14 people were killed in sectarian riots after a dispute broke out on the procession of a mosque in Golimar. House to house fighting was witnessed following mass attacks on mosques and imambargahs; some of these prayer places were set on fire. Into the fray entered organisations like the Shia Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Fiqah-e-Jafria (TNFJ), later rechristened the Tehrik-e Jafaria Pakistan and Swad-e-Azam. Though the leaders of both these groups belong to the people from Hazara or NWFP, they have established their bases in Karachi. This has led to an intensification of sectarian clashes in the city. Ethnic, Political and religous groups with their own militias arenât exactly a good recipe for peace. The Zia era also saw increase in campus violence in Karachi. JI, which supported Zia till he banned the students unions, used its student-wing, the Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba (IJT) to control the colleges and universities in the city. There is no doubt that the IJT was the most organised student group. It also had a militant streak. It could not be challenged by any other group except the Nationalist Students Federation (NSF). But the NSF faded in the face of IJT until a small student group representing Mohajir students and calling itself the All Pakistan Mohajir Student Organisation (APMSO) came on the scene. The IJT got its first real challenge at the hands of the APMSO. The APMSO exploited the issue of injustice meted out to the Urdu-speaking students: quota-system, admissions and lack of employment opportunities were some of the issues it raised. They soon attracted many ethnic Mohajir IJT students, who joined the APMSO. The IJT retaliated by using strong-arm tactics to put down the APMSO. This did not diminish the popularity of the APMSO but led to armed clashes and violence on the campuses. In 1986, the founder members of the APMSO launched the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (now Mutahidda Qaumi Movement). A pharmacy student, Altaf Hussain, from the University of Karachi led the MQM. Hussain was earlier sentenced to nine months in prison by a military court for allegedly burning a Pakistani flag. The MQM were able to eject the JI from Karachi for a time, by being more violent than them, but the Pak establishment declared war on them which diverted their attention and resources. The JI has made a big come back in Karachi of late. But the watershed year was 1984. In that year Karachi took a violent turn and life has never been normal in the city since then. It all started with a simple road accident in which a bus overran a college girl, Bushra Zaidi. This led to Mohajir-Pashtun riots since the city transport was mostly run by Pashtun companies while the girl who got killed was a Mohajir. The accident provided the pretext for long simmering tensions to come out in the open. Despite Ziaâs utmost efforts to finish off the PPP, including murdering its founder-chairman Mr Bhutto through a judicial process, the party remained the most potent threat to his regime. At first Zia wanted to divide the PPP but failed in that venture. He and his cronies then changed the tactic and planned to divide Sindh, the PPPâs stronghold. Ironically, the Army has continued to be tight with Fazl and the Jihadi groups at least in part to weaken the PPP. The increasing fundamentalism in the country has certainly ejected the PPP from the NWFP. This led to his courting the MQM in urban Sindh and Sindhi nationalists in rural Sindh. The MQM and the Jeay Sindh founder G M Syed had one thing in common: a hatred for the PPP. MQM blamed Mr Bhutto for the injustices to the Mohajirs while Syed always termed the PPP as the agent of Punjab. Syed was also opposed to the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy. Indeed, some observers say in the initial days of the MQM, the party workers were given arms and training by Jeay Sindh activists. However, very soon the establishment started feeling the threat from a strong Sindhi-Mohajir axis. The rise of the MQM was also seen as a threat to Punjab. In circumstances that still remain mysterious, the MQM procession was first fired at near Sohrab Goth and then a clash was orchestrated between the Mohajirs and Sindhis in Hyderabad on the petty issue of changing the name of Hyder Bux Jatoi chowk in that city. Both events led to a schism between the two ethnic communities. Ziaâs death on August 17, 1988 in a plane crash changed the political scenario in the country. Elections were announced, but just a month before the polls the country saw the worst terrorist attack. Some 200 people were killed in merely ten minutes in Hyderabad, mostly Mohajirs after unidentified gunmen opened fire on them. The next day some 150 people, this time mostly Sindhis, were killed in Karachi. Until today, the massacres remain a big mystery. However, all sides are convinced that the attacks were orchestrated by intelligence agencies. MQM swept the polls in urban Sindh while the PPP secured the most seats in rural Sindh. The province was polarised and remains so until the writing of this report. The polls also allowed the MQM to flex its muscles and the party began to run Karachi and Hyderabad as its fiefdoms. Since then all political opponents have complained of MQMâs Dr Jekyll-Mr Hyde character. However, the agencies then split the MQM in 1991 and created another, Haqiqi group, which they supported from the eve of the military operation in 1992 until the original MQM was declared a patriotic party once again and, today, enjoys the fruits of its rapprochement with the establishment. But the intervening years saw infighting between the two groups that generated much violence in Karachi with both sides targeting each otherâs activists, killing them mercilessly and dumping the chopped bodies on the streets in gunny bags. It also give rise to militancy in the MQM because of its strong power. The army operation in 1992 and the agenciesâ naked backing of the Haqiqis also did much to revive the waning fortunes of the MQM. Indeed, while the establishment kept supporting the Haqiqis until as recently as 2002, the group could never emerge as a viable political force to challenge the MQM. All the police officers in Karachi who were encouraged to summarily execute members of the MQM during the 90âs now find themselves in a city run by the party, which has reduced their life expectancy somewhat. The Haqiqiâs have been dumped by the establishment, so they have made contacts with the Jihadis, and have offered their death sqauds to them. The post 9/11 years have added the element of religious terrorism to Karachiâs woes. The city hit international headlines when Al Qaeda activists were caught from here and after a Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and then beheaded by religious militants. The city has also seen increased activity by religious terrorist groups, suicide bombings and other attacks, including sectarian killings. As things stand, Karachi is poised to go from bad to worse. To this situation everyone has contributed: from political parties to the religious groups to the establishment and even the citizens themselves. But its troubles do not just stop here. Its infrastructure is creaky and about to wither off. It is controlled by mafias of every conceivable type and denomination. Its parks, roads and buildings have been destroyed and the powerful, both political and criminal (sometimes it means the same), have broken every law in the book to put scars on Karachiâs face. It may be Pakistanâs commercial hub but it is calling out for help. General Musharraf belongs to this city. He has a vision for Pakistan: a modern, progressive and economically viable city. Without Karachi, that vision cannot come to fruition. Can he do something to restore this city to its old peace and glory? |
| Posted by:Paul Moloney |
| #1 so the burmese are muslims? this looks very interesting, however i must find the time for it. Thanks. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-05-21 10:06:15 AM |