The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan has opened a public mobilisation drive for new administrative units, with party chairman Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui announcing a major rally on Sharea Faisal on Nov 29. Speaking on Sunday at a workers’ convention at KMC Park in PIB Colony, Karachi, he framed the campaign as a push for constitutional and administrative reform.
Dr Siddiqui, who is also federal education minister, said referendums under the Constitution should decide whether people want new administrative units in Sindh and in the country’s three other provinces. He argued that the present provincial setup has not delivered inclusive governance or a fair share of resources.
Rally and referendum call
Addressing party workers, including a large presence of women, Dr Siddiqui said the moment had come for those he described as oppressed to stand against what he called an entrenched system of feudal domination and family-based politics. He told the gathering that “the era of feudal democracy has run its course” and that creating new administrative units had become “the country’s destiny.”
He said the Nov 29 gathering would be an important step in that campaign. The party, he added, wants political power and national resources to reach neighbourhoods and ordinary citizens instead of staying with influential families. A democratic system, he said, cannot be called representative if workers and common people have no real voice in parliament.
Asked about the proposed province, he recalled that migrants who came to Pakistan had given up property in India for the new state.
Party leaders on governance and identity
Senior MQM-P leader Dr Farooq Sattar told the convention that the four-province arrangement had become a way to keep power with a handful of political families. He pressed for participatory governance at the grassroots and said administrative restructuring was needed to meet growing urban problems and public complaints.
He also criticised the Pakistan Peoples Party for how it has run Sindh over the past 18 years. The proposed units, he said, would not weaken Sindh’s cultural identity, and the party would keep embracing Sindhi traditions such as the cap and ajrak.
Former Karachi mayor Wasim Akhtar urged workers to stay united under Dr Siddiqui’s leadership, saying supporters had stood with the organisation through hard times. Party leaders also credited former Karachi Tanzeemi Committee in-charge Hammad Siddiqui with organisational work behind the scenes. Senior leader Mustafa Kamal and his close aides were absent.
Who was present
The meeting drew senior figures including Syed Aminul Haque, Sindh Assembly Opposition Leader Ali Khurshidi, members of the party’s coordination committee, lawmakers, and many workers from district East. The Nov 29 Sharea Faisal rally is now the next public test of how far the street campaign for new administrative units can go.
Aasan alfaaz mein
MQM-P ne nai administrative units ke liye Karachi mein campaign shuru kar di hai. Chairman Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui ne 29 November ko Sharea Faisal par bari rally ka elaan kiya hai. Woh kehte hain ke Constitution ke tehat referendum se logon ki marzi poochi jaye. Agar yeh demand aage badhti hai to provinces ke andr naya intezami dhancha aur resources ka batwara siyasi debate ka markaz ban sakta hai.
