Punjab politics: MQM, PML-Q demand local govt elections

Pervaiz Elahi accepts MQM’s invitation to April 10 rally.

LAHORE:

The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML-Q) have demanded local government elections in Punjab as early as possible.

At a meeting held at the residence of PML-Q leader Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, leaders from both parties spoke of shared objectives in Punjab. The PML-Q, which led the majority in Punjab from 2002 to 2007, has welcomed the MQM’s attempts to become a national party and increase its presence in Punjab. Farooq Sattar led the MQM delegation.

Observers view the PML-Q’s alliance with the MQM as an attempt by the party to bolster its chances of winning the next provincial elections and gaining back the chief minister’s house, currently held by a member of the rival Nawaz faction of the PML, Shahbaz Sharif. The MQM will be holding a joint rally in Lahore on April 10, an invitation to which Pervaiz Elahi formally accepted at Thursday’s meeting.

The demand for local elections is one key issue on which the interests of the MQM and the PML-Q converge. The system of elected local governments had been introduced by former President Pervez Musharraf in 2001. After completing two four-year terms, the system was abolished by all provincial governments in 2009. In Punjab, they were abolished even earlier, in 2008.

The MQM and the PML-Q are minority parties in their respective provinces of Sindh and Punjab, yet both have a distinct advantage when it comes to local governments. MQM’s Mustafa Kamal was a hugely popular mayor of Karachi and most elected local government officials in Punjab belonged to the PML-Q before they were ousted from office.

Most political analysts agree that both parties would be highly competitive in local elections in Sindh and Punjab, despite the fact that the provincial assemblies in those provinces are dominated by their political rivals. The Sindh Assembly is run by the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) whereas the PML-N has a majority in the Punjab Assembly.

The PML-Q has been gaining some electoral ground, however. In a by-election held earlier this month to fill a National Assembly seat from Dera Ghazi Khan, NA-172, the party’s Awais Leghari won by a landslide. Pervaiz Elahi was keen to point to this victory as a symbol of PML-Q’s relevance to national and Punjab politics.

At a press conference after the meeting, Pervaiz Elahi lashed out at the PML-N for what he called its “reign of poverty, unemployment and inflation.” The PML-Q has been losing members in the Punjab Assembly after several of its legislators have been induced to defect to the PML-N.



Published in The Express Tribune, April 8^th, 2011.