Providing an alternative: To succeed in Sindh, PTI must set aside the feudals, say analysts

They believe that Sindhis have been left disappointed by PPP policies.


Our Correspondent November 23, 2014

KARACHI: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) jalsa can awaken Sindhis to the 'new Sindh,' opening up alternative choices for them, political analysts in the province believe. "But this will only happen if there is honest local leadership instead of feudal lords with notorious pasts."

While talking about the rally held in Aliabad, 10 kilometres off Larkana, journalist Sohail Sangi said that the majority of Sindhis have been disappointed by the policies of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government. "There is a vacuum that must be filled, but this cannot be done by those who patronise criminals and contribute to the province's ghost schools," he added.



"The party must focus on the issues of the Sindhi people, rather than relying on opportunists who change their loyalties seasonally," he stressed. "The middle and lower middle classes of the province have parted ways with the landlords but PTI, which claims to represent this class, is joining hands with them."

Many others believe that change will come if the leadership intends to deliver it and that the same landlords who have blotted records could change their ways under PTI chief Imran Khan's direction.

According to well-known Sindhi writer Zulfiqar Halipoto, Sindhi feudals toed the party line when Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto led the PPP, but the current leaders had destroyed the party. "The PTI can emerge as a force to be reckoned with in Sindh, because the PPP government has ruined every provincial institution," he said. "Corruption, mismanagement, the terrible law and order situation and incompetent officials have tarnished the PPP's reputation in Sindh." Halipoto urged isolated Sindhi groups to join mainstream politics, claiming that PTI would be a good alternative for them.

The two parties react

Although PTI leaders have lauded the rally as the 'tsunami that hit Larkana,' PPP leaders said that the PTI-supporting landlords had dragged people to an 'artificial show'.

"Why would the people of Sindh have given us their mandate in the last election if our government had not delivered?" asked provincial information minister Sharjeel Inam Memon. "PTI cannot misguide Sindhis through propaganda and forged, abusive allegations against other politicians." He added that Imran's speech contained nothing but political rhetoric. "Imran's dream to defeat the PPP will not come true," asserted provincial education minister Nisar Ahmed Khuhro. "The issues he champions are issues that the people of Sindh resent, so they will not accept him." He added that the identity of the jalsa participants was what counted, not their numbers.

Meanwhile, PTI provincial chief Nadir Akmal Leghari announced that the party would hold public and corner meeting in every tehsil and union council of Sindh, building itself up at the grass roots level.

"PTI can make a difference in Pakistan," he claimed, adding that the rally's success had scared the PPP. "Our jalsa has given the message that the people of Larkana have rejected the PPP's status quo."

Published in The Express Tribune, November 24th, 2014.

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