The MQM pulls off a jenny

The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) has returned to President Asif Ali Zardari’s pack… or perhaps it never really left.

As the saying in Punjabi goes, “jethon di khoti, othay aan khaloti”, meaning that a jenny (female donkey) after straying off returns to its original spot, the MQM is all set to renew its vows with the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and after its brief adventure as an opposition party, is ready to resume its role as a coalition partner.

MQM’s Dr Ishratul Ebad Khan has returned to take over as the Sindh governor again after his party chief Altaf Hussain gave him the green signal following the latter’s telephonic conversation with the president.

Now the party is expected to return to the treasury benches in the federal and provincial governments anytime soon.

So the question that arises is: why did the MQM make so much fuss at the time of its break-up with the PPP? The hullabaloo created by the MQM when it left the ruling coalition gave an impression that there won’t be going back this time around.

In a much trumpeted and chest-beating fashion, the party had announced that it was parting ways with the government. Then there was the Dr Zulfiqar Mirza episode that left more than 100 people dead in Karachi.

Regretfully, the whole drama is now winding up with an anti-climax. The MQM has certainly got it wrong this time. Its decision to become part of the government again would seriously hurt its credibility and many are likely to believe that it’s ready to compromise on any principle as long as it carries on staying in power.

The party has blown a great opportunity to prove its critics wrong and show that its first priority is public interest and not power. But such examples are far and few on our political landscape.

The odd world of Rehman Malik

It’s never surprising when the man with a bag full of vibrantly coloured ties, rigid curly hair and beady eyes, the one and only Interior Minister Rehman Malik pops up a surprise for the nation.
This time he has hinted that foreign elements could be involved in the Karachi violence on the basis of the Israel-made weapons recovered from people arrested in the city.
He said that the Israel-made weapons recovered from over 200 arrested people prove that foreign hands are responsible for the unrest in Karachi.
The next day when it was realised that the minister had made a fool of himself by uttering such rubbish, the spokesman of the Interior Ministry clarified that the electronic and print media misinterpreted Mr Malik’s statement and he had not made any statement alleging involvement of any country, including Israel, in what’s happening in Karachi.
The ministry’s spokesman may be trying to clean up the mess made by the minister, but the fact is that Mr Malik is still hopelessly trying to pin the blame for the situation in Karachi on some outside force while pursuing the long-dead policy of reconciliation.
But then again, Mr Malik should be given a break. At least he only dragged in Israel into the matter, similar to how the mullah brigade keeps holding the US responsible for all ills of the country. Otherwise, with the vivid sense of imagination that Mr Malik possesses and his keen interest in science fiction (he described the PNS Mehran attackers as characters from Star Wars), he could have said that aliens from outer space are killing people in Karachi and also collecting bhattas and taking over lands in the city.
The truth is that the Karachi predicament is local in nature. The people responsible for the killings and violence are not Israelis, Indians or Americans. They are its own. Mr Malik’s futile efforts to deceive the public won’t make a difference. The residents of Karachi know better than that. Mr Malik’s remarks are only as amusing as his ties.