Changing trends: Edging out old-timers, female politicians take their seats

PPP’s Shazia Marri and Shamsun Nisa Memon defeat favourites in Sanghar and Thatta.

KARACHI:

The major-league of political parties today might paint a picture of male leadership but the by-elections in Sindh on Thursday, in which Pakistan Peoples Party’s Shazia Atta Marri and Shamsun Nisa Memon won from Sanghar and Thatta, proved that women in politics should not be undermined when it comes to defeating their male counterparts.

The female candidates secured unprecedented victories - Shazia won against the the Hur Jamaat, which hasn’t lost from NA-235 since the 1970s under the leadership of Pir Pagara, and Shamsun Nisa bagged NA-237 from the influential Shirzai group of Thatta.

Shazia, who is from Sanghar, had also contested her hometown-seat in the May 11 when the general elections but lost to Pir Syed Sadaruddin Shah Rashdi of the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional. Rashdi, however, after winning from Khairpur Mirs, left the seat vacant. When the Election Commission of Pakistan announced it would hold by-polls for NA-235, PPP once again gave its ticket to Shazia, for whom, second time was the charm.

The former provincial information minister defeated Khuda Bux Dars, a loyalist of the Hur Jamaat who also served as the Taluka nazim during General (retd) Pervez Musharraf’s tenure, by securing 66, 166 votes.  PML-F’s workers alleged that their voters were forcibly barred from taking part in the election, which led to Shazia’s win from the constituency, but PPP refuted the allegation.

Historical background

“This is the same constituency where the Hur Jamaat, led by the late Pir Pagara (Shah Mardan Shah) had given a tough time to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s nominee in the 1970 election. Bhutto’s party had swept the elections from every corner of Sindh but it had to bend to the influence of Hur Jamaat,” said writer Mir Muhammad Nizamani. “An interesting story has unfolded after Shazia’s victory - her father, Atta Muhammad Marri, was the PML-F candidate who had defeated Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s nominee in the 1970 election. In a turn of events, his daughter has now become the frontrunner against PML-F.” He told The Express Tribune that apart from Atta Muhammad, former Sindh Assembly speaker, Pir Pagara had also given an MPA ticket to his wife and Shazia’s mother, Parveen Marri.

“Shah Mardan Shah (the late Pir Pagara) always supported the Marri family because of Ali Muhammad Marri, Shazia’s grandfather. He was the only member of Sindh Assembly who had opposed the Hur Act in 1942, which had the members of Hur Jamaat fighting against the British Raj as terrorists. This act had paved the way for the death sentence of Syed Sibghatullah Shah Rashidi, father of Shah Mardan Shah,” Nizamani said.

Victorious in Thatta

In another surprising move, for the by-polls in NA-237, PPP had nominated Shamasun Nisa Memon against Riaz Hussain Shah Shirazi, a member of the Shirazi group of Thatta which recently joined the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz. The influential group had secured four seats in Sindh Assembly and one in National Assembly in the May 11 election.

Shamasun Nisa, who polled 84,819 votes, was reportedly nominated because of her family’s old association with the PPP. After her elder son and the then Sindh minister, Jalil Memon, died in a road accident in 2009 and the court disqualified her younger son who won this seat in the May 11 election, Sadiq Ali Memon, the party decided to nominate a candidate from the same family. Her late husband, Abdul Hameed Memon, was also a parliamentarian while her late father-in-law, Sadiq Memon, was one of the founding members of PPP.

“I am very thankful to my party leadership and the voters who supported me. I will remain committed to my party and will work for my people, especially women, at every platform,” she said. Winner of the seat in 2002, Ayaz Shah Shirazi, however, alleged that the PPP candidate won because of massive rigging. These claims were negated by former PPP’s president in Thatta, Abdul Wahid Soomro, who called the elections fair.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 24^th, 2013.