Dire consequences: Restore Rangers powers or else, threatens QAT president

Ayaz Latif Palijo warns of laying siege to homes, offices of PPP MPAs and Sindh Assembly building

HYDERABAD: As political pressure grows in favour of extending the Rangers' powers, Sindhi nationalist leader Ayaz Latif Palijo has threatened the provincial government with province-wide protests. At a press conference in Hyderabad on Monday, the Qaumi Awami Tehreek (QAT) leader gave a deadline of four days to the government to restore the paramilitary force's policing authority.

"After four days we will begin laying siege to the houses and offices of the MPAs who supported the move to curtail the Rangers' powers. We will also give a call for a shutter-down strike in the province," claimed Palijo. "And after that we will surround the Sindh Assembly," he said.

Palijo, who is also a constitutional lawyer, argued that the government has based its contention on a misinterpretation of Article 147 of the Constitution.

"Why did the [Sindh] Assembly not hold a session for the terrorist attacks in Safoora Goth, Shikarpur and Jacobabad, about the deaths of children in Tharparkar and the adulteration with sand of the subsidised wheat for the drought-affected people?" he asked. "Now when a close aide of Asif Ali Zardari, Dr Asim Hussain, is facing an inquiry the assembly members want to prevent the Rangers from pursuing this and other similar cases," he accused.

The QAT leader also blamed the federal government for the situation, saying that it was conniving with the provincial authorities against the Rangers. "They [the federal government] can exercise Article 149 to authorise the Rangers in Sindh but they have thrown the ball in the province's court. The aversion is manifest," claimed Palijo.

The article's clause-4 states that, "the executive authority of the Federation shall also extend to the giving of directions to a province as to the manner in which the executive authority thereof is to be exercised for the purpose of preventing any grave menace to the peace or tranquility or economic life of Pakistan or any part thereof."

Others speak out

"The Zardari league is staging a drama to stop the Rangers' operation. They want to throw Sindh again in the fire of corruption and terrorism," accused estranged Pakistan Peoples Party leader Dr Zulfiqar Mirza, while talking to the media in Talhar, Badin district. He stressed that the people of Sindh want the operation against terrorism and corruption to continue and become stronger.

The Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Pakistan president and chief of the Milli Yakjahti Council Dr Sahibzada alKhair Muhammad Zubair also condemned the Sindh government. "They have put the province at stake just to save Dr Asim," he observed at a press conference in Hyderabad on Monday. "All the thieves have joined forces to save one of the biggest thieves," he accused.

Zubair commented that corrupt governments can never hold corrupt politicians and bureaucrats accountable for their corruption.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2015.