Karachi, once a small port town ruled under the British Empire, is now a bustling international transportation and telecommunications hub of about 18 million, accounting for roughly twenty percent of Pakistan’s Gross Domestic Product. Although Karachi has long been a diverse city, ethnic tensions have led to an outbreak of so-called target killings in the past few months.
On August 3, 2010, Raza Haider, a member of the Sindh Provincial Assembly, the provincial government that includes Karachi, was assassinated. Haider was a member of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), a party representing the Urdu-speaking majority of Karachi. In the wake of his assassination, Karachi saw an explosion of target killings, mostly aimed at members of the MQM. In the month following his death, about one hundred were killed, and on September 22, one of the MQM’s founding members, Dr. Imran Farooq, then living in London, was stabbed to death. The media portrayed Farooq’s assassination as a sign that the political tension in Karachi has taken on a larger dimension. By October 18, there had been 260 target killings since the year began, an increase of over a hundred since 2009. Although the MQM blames one of its political rivals, the Awami National Party (ANP), which represents Karachi’s seven million Pashtuns, the ANP has not taken responsibility for the killings. As a result, the citizens of Karachi have been left with a sense of chaos and insecurity about their city’s ethno-political situation.
What is the cause of this violence? The political and ethnic complexities of Karachi go back to the British Empire. Under British rule in the 1800s, Karachi grew to be a transportation hub; the British Navy used its strategic location on the Arabian Sea to bolster sea trade and colonial administration, and in World War II Karachi was an important air hub for the Allies. In 1947, when the British partitioned India and thus created Pakistan, the population of the city grew dramatically, due in large part to the migration of Urdu-speaking Muslim muhajirs (the Arabic word for emigrant. An estimate of 600,000 muhajirs settled in Karachi after partition.
In the 1980s, when the MQM was founded, its name stood for Muhajir Qaumi Movement (National Muhajir Movement), and although “United” (Muttahida) has now replaced “Muhajir,” the party still largely draws its strength from the Urdu-speaking muhajirs and their descendents. The MQM holds 51 of the 166 seats in the Sindh Provincial Assembly, and in the 2008 National Assembly election, Karachi’s districts voted overwhelmingly for the MQM. This political domination does not reflect the ethnic breakdown of the city. Karachi is supposedly home to seven million Pashtuns, who associate largely with the ANP, but who have only two seats in the Sindh Provincial Assembly. Such evidence suggests that elections in the city are plagued with gerrymandering, voter intimidation, or both.
The MQM has blamed the ANP for the killings of many of its members, which is possible; the under-represented ANP may be trying to get attention and hurt the MQM. However, as several members of the ANP have also been targeted, other factors seem to be involved as well.
Karachi has several drug cartels as well as a “land mafia,” whose violent tendencies may also be at play in the target killings. The “land mafia” seeks allegedly to improve the provisioning of electricity and water to the citizens of the sprawling and slum-ridden city, but tend toward violent means. These gangs weaken the Karachi government’s control over the city and lessen the sense of security of it citizens.
The Pakistani national government—challenged with myriad serious issues including flood recovery and Taliban infiltration—has done relatively little to quell the political violence in Karachi. Sindh Home Minister Zulfiqar Mirza said that 61 arrests had been made, but as of mid-November, no one had been convicted. Although paramilitary forces in the city attempted to keep violence to a minimum around the election time, the ANP was still concerned about election validity. Days before the vote, the ANP pledged to boycott the election on claims that the MQM would rig it. Ironically, the Free and Fair Elections Network (FAFEN) withdrew the officials who had been sent to monitor the election due to of safety concerns. The MQM has threatened to pull out of its coalition with President Zardari’s party, the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), over the government’s minimal responses to violence in Karachi.
The ethnic and political tensions in Karachi seem unlikely to calm in the near future, but the stakes are huge. As Pakistan’s banking and telecommunications center, Karachi’s stability and success is vital for that of the country as a whole. Target killings and forced shop-closures prevent businesses from performing well. The Taliban and Al Qaeda are allegedly present in Karachi, and the more chaotic the city becomes, the easier extremist infiltration could be. Although much international attention to Pakistan is devoted to areas with high levels of extremism such Waziristan, as an economic center and a microcosm of Pakistan’s ethnic diversity, Karachi should not be overlooked.
No comments:
Post a Comment