Demand for army in Karachi is constitutional: Sattar
August 27, 2013
The MQM leaders staged a symbolic walkout from the National Assembly over the deteriorating law and order situation in Karachi and Quetta today, followed by the members of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Awami Muslim League chief Sheikh Rasheed.
PTI's deputy parliamentary leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi, on a point of order, said that Karachi’s situation is grim while the government is displaying indifferent attitude by not being present in the session.
While addressing a press conference here after the NA session, Farooq Sattar said that the demand to call army is according to the constitution. He said that if the army’s help can be sought during the elections, then MQM’s demand to hand over Karachi to the army is also constitutional and democratic.
Sattar continued saying that if Rangers cannot control the situation and fail miserably in Karachi, then it’s absolutely lawful to summon the army.
He expressed serious concerns over Karachi’s volatile situation and said that political party workers are being killed on every day basis.
Earlier, MQM chief Altaf Hussain urged upon the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to hand over control of Karachi to the army, as the provincial government had totally failed to maintain law and order in the city.
Altaf Hussain said that the Lyari gang war terrorists attacked the Kachi localities with rockets and most modern weapons, while the Sindh government, Karachi administration, police and other law enforcing agencies have failed to come to the rescue of the Kachi community and, as a result, several people have thus far been killed and women amid dozens injured.
The persecuted members of the Kachi community took shelter away from their homes in interior Sindh and on the assurance of the Karachi Commissioner to provide them security returned to their homes on Monday. Altaf said these people were left unprotected and at the mercy of Lyari gang war terrorists who attacked them.
Altaf strongly condemned the attack on the Kachi community asked the Sindh chief minister, where is the Sindh government? Why have the police and law enforcing agencies disappeared from the restive areas of Lyari Town and what is the fault of the innocent and poor people of the Kachi community for which they are so cruelly being left at the mercy of the killers of Lyari gang war?
Altaf Hussain appealed to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to hand over the control of Karachi administration to the army in a bid to rescue the people of city including the trading community and industrialists from the Lyari gang war terrorists and extortionists.
