Tit for tat: PMA rift widens as polls held

Jatoi group of PMA’s Sindh chapter elects its president despite court orders

HYDERABAD: Dr Samrina Hashmi was elected the president of the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) Sindh’s Dr Hadi Bux Jatoi group on Sunday as rifts which developed in the association last year appeared to widen.

Dr Jatoi was the general secretary of PMA Sindh chapter till last year. However, the PMA replaced him with Dr Pir Manzoor Ali because he did not hold elections for about eight years.

Hashmi was in the rival PMA’s group and had accused Jatoi of using his influence to not regularly hold elections in Hyderabad.However, Jatoi had challenged the legitimacy of these elections in court. The civil court issued a stay order and elections scheduled for April 2011 were cancelled.

After this Dr Hashmi jumped ship and joined Jatoi’s group. This year, the group called for elections and they were held on  Sunday.  However, the rival group, led by Dr Pir Manzoor Ali, obtained a stay order from the civil court on Saturday for this year’s election as well, and accused Dr Jatoi of leading a ‘fake’ PMA.

On the other hand, Jatoi claimed that the elections were legitimate and went ahead with them. He said that 280 doctors from all of the 23 PMA branches in Sindh participated in the elections.

He said that last year’s elections were a violation of the PMA constitution.  According to Jatoi, the elections organised by the PMA’s central council in Bhit Shah last year were illegal. “Only an outgoing general secretary [Jatoi was at that time] has the authority to hold them.” For this year, Dr Jatoi retained his decade-long position of the general secretary.

However, the group represented by Dr Ali claims that only a handful of doctors, from a few branches, attended the event. “Compared to the total number of PMA members, which is over 12,000 doctors in Sindh, the number which came out in support on Sunday was very small,” he said. According to the PMA rules, association’s members are not allowed to vote for the Sindh chapter.

Ali also heaped scorn on Samrina Hashmi and accused her of opening fake accounts in PMA’s name with funds provided for the flood victims. Dr Hashmi replied that three more people had access to the bank accounts.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 9^th, 2012.