Karachi strike remarks: MQM chief calls for resignation of PM

Altaf Hussain terms friendship with Nawaz Sharif ‘a mistake’.

KARACHI: MQM chief Altaf Hussain on Saturday called for the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif over his comments on the frequent shutdowns observed in the port city.

Altaf made the demand while speaking to his workers at Nine-Zero on Saturday after calling them at the party headquarters, irked by the premier’s statement that Karachi shuts down “even if a fly dies”.

Terming his “friendship” with the premier a mistake, Altaf demanded that the PM resigns and get a medical check up for comparing the killings of citizens of Karachi to that of flies. Perturbed over frequent strikes in Karachi, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on a trip to the metropolis had said that “even if a fly dies, strike is called in Karachi” and this ‘culture of strikes’ had severely damaged the national economy.

The premier was referring to the frequent calls for mourning announced by the MQM to protest against the alleged extrajudicial killings of its workers.

“Being friends with Nawaz Sharif was a mistake,” he said at the general workers meeting. “He should resign.”

Also lashing out at the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the MQM chief said that while his party was being blamed for the Safoora massacre, the police arrested the workers of the JI who were responsible for the carnage.

“The intelligence agencies don’t see the people of JI who are involved in criminal activities. They were also involved in the attack on the Sri Lankan team [in Lahore],” he claimed.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14^th, 2015.