HYDERABAD: Sindh Culture Minister Sassui Palijo has gone public with threats she said she has been receiving since the day she supported a resolution against a separate province for Mohajirs.
Palijo did not mince words as she complained that Home Minister Manzoor Wassan had not properly investigated the threats. “He is only making comments [on it],” she said at a press conference on Sunday, during which she held up a copy of the letter she received at her residence.
At a separate press conference on Sunday, Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah described Palijo’s complaints against Wassan a matter between “two colleagues”. “These threats are not only against a hero but the whole Sindh and the PPP,” he observed. While the chief minister said that he had taken notice of the matter he could not give details of any progress.
After graffiti emerged calling for a separate province, the matter was taken up in the house of elected representatives on March 9. MPAs of the Pakistan Peoples Party, Pakistan Muslim League-Functional and the National Peoples Party signed a resolution after emotionally charged speeches against the graffiti.
Palijo said that she started receiving threats the next day while she was attending the Bhanbhore conference. On March 11, the PML-F’s MPA Nusrat Sehar Abbasi was the first of the signatories to the resolution to say on the floor of the house that she was being terrorised too.
Palijo said, however, that she would not be cowed. “Today, a complete strike was observed in Thatta while people protested in Tando Muhammad Khan and other areas,” she added, referring to reaction in her favour. “If these conspiracies do not end here, we will shut down the entire Sindh and all the highways until the elements behind it are exposed. The pathus (lackeys) of foreign agencies can’t intimidate Sindhis.”
The chief minister later said that Palijo’s statements regarding a provincewide strike and closing the highways was emotional and should have been avoided
According to Palijo, the letter was couriered by a shadowy group, the Mohajir Suba Liberation Army, from an address in Liaquatabad, Karachi. Palijo has requested the Sindh High Court for an investigation. She said the Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s deputy convenor, Federal Minister Farooq Sattar, has categorically stated that the party is against a geographical division of Sindh but he should also have expressed the same stance against an administrative division.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 26th, 2012.
COMMENTS (6)
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@DevilHunterX: Touche.
It is time for Sassui Palijo to have a taste of their (PPP) own medicine. Like all other issues in the country, PPP drags it feet on their own but these opportunists will never cease to become JIYALAS because they are worthless in any other form.
Whats wrong with Muhajir province?
Pakistan should have at least 500 provinces. In fact every MPA / MNA should have his/her own province.
What threats she was given.
It seems like the Sindhi Nationalist leaders are determined to create a division of Sindh. MQM has categorically stated that it is vehemently against the division of Sindh. The residents of Karachi do not feel it is in their interest to separate themselves from the Sindh province. The usual difficulties of life and the thorny issues faced by Karachiites are not unique to them; the whole province suffers from the same issues. Therefore it makes more sense to struggle for the alleviation of these issues on a province-wide basis, rather than only in Karachi: the unabated poverty, unemployment, lack of infrastructure, and the despicable condition of educational institutions.
No one wants Karachi to be a province, including the Karachi residents. Besides, hypothetically, even if Karachi were to be a province, the unemployed and oppressed citizens of Sindh will continue to arrive in Karachi looking for a livelihood, just as the people from Balochistan continue to arrive in Karachi for similar reasons, though they have their own province. Also, just look at all the Balochi Sardars who live in Karachi; they maintain their ancestral homes in their villages, but they live in Karachi. And so do all the Sindhi Waderas.