Khan's
Crusade
By Rafi Aamer
New York
After the
tragic events in Karachi on May 12, Imran Khan
of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf has mounted a spirited
campaign against Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM)
in general and its leader Altaf Hussain in particular.
Currently, Imran Khan is in England petitioning
the office of the Prime Minister to conduct a
comprehensive investigation against Altaf Hussain.
Imran Khan is fighting on two fronts simultaneously.
While taking the MQM to task for violence and
supporting a dictator, he also vows to fight alongside
the Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Iftikhar
Muhammad Chaudry, for the independence of judiciary.
Mr. Khan must have stumbled upon such principles
only recently because when the judges of the Supreme
Court of Pakistan were being made to take fresh
oaths under Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO)
and the ones who weren't willing were sent packing,
including the then Chief Justice of Pakistan,
Imran Khan was supporting the same dictator and,
in the words of Ian Williams, he was Musharraf's
biggest cheerleader.
Upon his unremarkable emergence on Pakistan's
political scene, Imran Khan presented himself
as a person who would not negotiate on principles
and positioned himself against the establishment
and the prevalent political culture of corruption
and convenient alliances. He did not demonstrate
the traits of an average Pakistani politician.
It seems that in his zeal against MQM and Altaf
Hussain, Imran Khan has decided to change tracks
and adopt the run-of-the-mill methods and tools
to attack the political opponents.
There is nothing new or novel in what Mr. Khan
has to say about MQM and its leadership. In his
speeches and interviews against MQM, Imran Khan
is presenting the same litany of charges that
have been leveled against MQM by almost every
political party in Pakistan at some point in the
past. Imran Khan is talking about issues like
Jinnah Pur and when asked for the proof, dodges
the question like a seasoned politician. Imran
Khan implies that MQM, or at least its leadership
cadre, uses terror to achieve the political goals.
The biggest problem for Imran Khan in his crusade
to reduce MQM’s image to a band of gun-totting
hooligans is the huge support-base for MQM and
its leadership in urban Sind. In a recent interview
on Geo TV's program `Jawab Deh', Imran Khan said
that MQM's electoral victories did not mean anything
because Hitler's party also "used to sweep
elections". That, apparently unbeknownst
to Mr. Khan, is not true. Far from sweeping the
elections, Hitler's Nazi Party never even won
the majority of popular votes. Their best electoral
returns ever were in the elections of March 1933
when they were in power. Even after applying all
possible means to stop the other parties from
campaigning and an almost complete elimination
of communists, the Nazi Party obtained 43.9% of
the votes and they achieved parliamentary majority
only with the help of their allies. Comparison
of a temporary blip in electoral success of the
Nazi Party between 1930 and 1933 with MQM's electoral
dominance in Karachi spanning almost two decades
is a nonstarter. Regardless of the question of
the validity of that comparison, Mr. Khan is yet
to explain the mechanism thru which 700,000 people
could be brought to the polling stations and made
to vote for MQM. All Mr. Khan tells us is that
MQM is a fascist party and that is why it wins
the elections.
There is certain truth to some of Mr. Khan's assertions
about the methods of MQM but it is also true that
despite those methods, which are well known to
the people of Karachi, MQM commands respect of
a large number of people in urban Sind. Mr. Khan's
assertion that people who vote for MQM do that
only because they are harassed is an insult to
those voters.
It's very interesting to note that after May 12,
Imran Khan has become the most vocal of all the
political leaders talking against MQM. Is he really
that passionate about the issue or is he being
played by his political allies? Imran Khan is
a member of national assembly from Mianwali—a
seat he won by a narrow margin--and he heads a
political party that has a grand total of one
seat in the National Assembly. The number of votes
received by the candidates of Mr. Khan's party
in Karachi in last elections was 26,560 (compared
with MQM's 682, 275 votes). Wouldn't it be better,
politically and strategically, that the issue
of political violence in Karachi is taken up by
an entity that is an actual player of Karachi's
politics? Mr. Khan has admitted that he feels
ideologically and politically close to Muttahida
Majlis-e-Amal (MMA). He voted for Maulana Fazl
ur Rehman in the elections for the Prime Minister
of Pakistan—to utter dismay of some of the
senior ranking members of his own party who wanted
Mr. Khan to abstain. Mr. Khan is sitting next
to Qazi Hussain Ahmed in every other picture.
Contrary to Mr. Khan's own political party, the
MMA has a substantial presence in Karachi. Why
hasn't Mr. Khan asked MMA to take the lead on
this issue?
Is Imran Khan seeking any help at all? In the
same interview quoted above, Mr. Khan admitted
that, to build a case against MQM, he had sought
the help of General (Retd.) Naseerullah Babur.
That fact, in and of itself, is quite disappointing.
It means that Mr. Khan is not morally perturbed
to be seeking help from someone who unleashed
a storm of extra-judicial killings during his
tenure as the interior minister. It also means
that the old Imran Khan who abhorred Pakistan
People's Party and didn't believe in convenient
political alliances is no more. The new Imran
Khan can knock at any door, be it PPP or US Congress,
in the time of need. Mr. Khan is not perturbed
by many other things as well. The journalists
reported several incidents of crossfire in Karachi
on May 12. Regardless of who started what, it's
a fact that MQM is not the only entity in Karachi
that uses violence to achieve political goals.
And yet, Mr. Khan's anger is only pointed at MQM.
He is practically blind to the fascist methods
of various student organizations patronized by
the very people whom he admittedly feels politically
and ideologically close to. If Mr. Khan sees the
events of May 12 thru the eyes of a national level
politician, he cannot single-out MQM for the political
violence in Karachi and if he does that then he
is taking sides in Karachi's politics and sticking
his nose where it doesn't belong.
The best way for Imran Khan to reform Karachi's
politics is to become a part of it. Recently,
Imran Khan challenged General Musharraf to contest
election against Mr. Khan in any constituency
in Pakistan. If he is so confident of his popularity,
he should consider contesting next elections from
Liaquatabad, Karachi and to show the measure of
his confidence, let it be the only constituency
where he files the candidacy papers.
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