Unexpected move: London-based MQM leader likely to become Hyderabad mayor

Party sources claim Dr Saleem Danish will be nominated for the post

KARACHI: A London-based Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Rabita Committee member is likely to become the next mayor of Hyderabad, claim party sources.

The announcement has yet to be made but party sources said that unofficially Dr Saleem Danish is being nominated by the MQM as the mayor of Hyderabad. A former MQM UK organiser and a current member of the Rabita Committee in London, Danish arrived in the country early Wednesday morning.

A party worker since the mid-1980s, he was elected as a councillor in the 1987 local government elections from Hyderabad, his hometown. However, Danish left the country in 1989 for the UK after he was injured in an assassination attempt. After his return, he submitted nominated papers for the reserved labour seat in Hyderabad.

Earlier, names of local party leaders in Hyderabad such as Zafar Rajput, Sohail Mashadi and Rafiq Ajmeri had been thrown about in relation to the mayoral post. However sources did not say why a UK-based leader was being nominated by the party.

Meanwhile, another senior party leader, Wasay Jalil, who also returned from the UK has filed nomination papers on the reserved labour seat from Karachi.

Jalil, is a member of the Rabita Committee and has served as the nazim of Gulshan-e-Iqbal in the last local bodies' election and is likely to be elected chairperson of district East. Speaking to The Express Tribune, Jalil said that the party would stress on infrastructure and cleanliness in the city and hope that the powers of the elected representatives, deputy mayors and mayors are restored.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 22^nd,  2016.