Sindh Assembly: Treasury benches fill up after MQM and PPP patch up

Nine-day boycott ends as MQM legislators return to the Sindh Assembly session.

KARACHI:

A nine-day boycott ended on Wednesday when Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) legislators returned to the Sindh Assembly session after burying their differences with the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP).

On the rather joyous occasion, legislators passed a resolution to congratulate and acknowledge the struggle of President Asif Ali Zardari and Altaf Hussan to “unite the people of Sindh”. The resolution was moved by PPP’s Bachal Shah who called the patch-up “a new chapter in the history of Sindh”.

Teacher protests

Sindh Education Minister Pir Mazharul Haq told the house that the Sindh Professor and Lecturers Association (SPLA) protested in an effort to win voter sympathy. The SPLA has split and its election is around the corner. The SPLA had tried marching from DJ Science College to Chief Minister House on Tuesday to demand promotions and pay-scale increases but were beaten back by batons, tear-gas and water cannons. An identical protest and police reaction took place in November last year.

The education minister said that SPLA’s demands were met when 2,200 lecturers and professors were promoted. He said that as the SPLA was not a union, but a welfare organisation of the teaching staff of colleges it could not protest like this. The education department has sent a summary to the chief minister to provide time-scale promotions. Meanwhile, Haq suggested that a house committee look into the ‘ghost lecturers and professors’ who prefer to run their private tuition centres rather than teaching at colleges. If they continued, we will have no choice but to fire these ghost teachers who will be replaced by ad-hoc lecturers, he said.

Hyderabad prison operation

Legislators demanded an inquiry into the Hyderabad jail operation in which seven prisoners were killed and more than 40 were injured. As the session started with Nisar Khuhro in chair, PPP MPA Ghulam Qadir Chandio drew the attention of the house towards the incident. “We fail to understand who provides mobile phones, weapons and drugs to prisoners,” he said. The speaker said that Home Minister Zulfiqar Mirza should answer, rightly so, as he had the additional portfolio of jails. But Mirza was not present.

Qamar David’s death

Minority MPA Saleem Khurshid Khokhar demanded a judicial inquiry into the alleged murder of Qamar David, a Christian under-trial prisoner accused in two blasphemy cases. David died on Tuesday after being taken to Civil hospital from Central Jail, Karachi. According to Khokhar, he did not die of a heart attack but was murdered.

Fake appointments

PPP MPA Mir Hassan Khoso said the Jacobabad administration has issued fake appointment orders and adjusted more than a dozen people in different departments. “I have brought the order of the health department along with me. I want to know who gave these people jobs without fulfilling any criterion.” As Health Minister Dr Sagheer Ahmed was not present, MQM MPA Muhammad Ali Shah assured him that an impartial inquiry would be conducted.

Peacock hunting

Bilqees Mukhtiar of the MQM raised the hunting of peacocks in Thar. She said that some ‘influential’ people have started the hunting with the help of the local administration. Wildlife Minister Dr Dayaram Essarani assured her that action will be taken after an inquiry.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 17^th, 2011.