Let’s clean Lyari mess first!

The police and Rangers officials claim to have apprehended over 5,000 suspects for their alleged involvement in heinous crimes — targeted killings, extortion and kidnapping for ransom, etc, — since the Karachi operation began on September 5. Officials vowed to fight till their last drop of blood; till they freed Karachi from all its criminals, arms and drugs. The important question, however, remains unanswered: will the highly politicised law enforcement agencies really be able to establish their writ over Karachi? And all this is expected when, so early on, they have miserably failed to establish their writ in the neighbourhoods of Lyari?

As of now, they can’t even enter the narrow streets of Lyari, despite claiming to have killed around two dozen gangsters and arresting several others in ongoing operations in the area in the last two-and-a-half months. The killings and arrests of gangsters by Rangers and the police in Lyari have continued, no doubt, and the affected areas of Lyari are cordoned off by law enforcers on a daily basis, but the gangsters continue to fight with each other — and they do not hesitate to attack the law enforcers either. Firing rockets and lobbing hand grenades is still a routine practice in Lyari.

A number of visits to Lyari have been made by Director General Rangers Major General Rizwan Akhtar and the Karachi police chief Shahid Hayat for monitoring the ongoing operations. Those in charge have given a free hand to their subordinates on the ground and directed them to continue the operation until all gangsters are eliminated but so far, the latter are just getting stronger by the day.

Interestingly, there was only one gang operating out of Lyari when the law enforcement agencies started the operation but now, two more gangs have surfaced. These developments raise some tough questions.

Lyari has become a challenge for our security agencies and they should not take the area’s problems lightly because their reputation is directly connected to their success there. If the law enforcers want to gain the trust of the people of Karachi, then they have to clean Lyari’s mess, dislodge every criminal and make that a place worth living in.

If these officials fail to fix Lyari, there is no way they will be able to clean this entire city of 20 million people — many of whom possess weapons from almost every country in the world.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 30^th, 2013.