DUBAI: The MQM accusations against the FIA and Intelligence Bureau, both organisations totally under the control of President Asif Ali Zardari, that the British government had been fed with unfounded reports against the MQM, has exposed a new dimension of PPP-MQM relations and it is now obvious that the PPP has been using the UK government to pressurise Altaf Hussain to fall in line.
These accusations, seen in the context of the statement of Altaf Hussain some days ago asking Karachiites to stock up rations for 30 days, which was followed immediately by intervention of the London government, including a call from the UK foreign secretary to MQMs governor of Sindh, explain why the MQM chief suddenly started speaking English to apologise for his call and tried to control the damage caused by his remarks.
Now it has been revealed that the UK government was not working on its own but it was Zardaris intelligence outfits that were feeding London some **** and bull, or whatever, stories and these reports were used to pressurise Altaf Hussain, a British citizen, to change track fast so that the Zardari outfit in Pakistan was not disturbed.
Whatever comes out of the so-called inquiry that has been ordered by President Zardari into the allegations of Altaf Hussain is not clear but it can be easily said that nothing will come out as no official of the FIA or IB can have the courage and guts to send reports against an ally of the PPP, which has tremendous political and nuisance value, to any foreign government.
So what can be safely assumed is that these reports were sent with the specific authorisation of the PPP high-ups, specifically the president, as he controls all political matters. Now that Altaf has publicly complained and told the nation that the UK government had used these reports to pressurise him, Zardari is on the backfoot and trying to cover up the matter by ordering a probe which will go nowhere.
But that may have been a demand by Mr Hussain himself, from President Zardari, as he needs a face-saving cover-up to hush up the matter out of public eye at the moment, specially when he is about to announce his umpteenth comeback into the Sindh coalition government.
Yet it is evident that matters between the PPP and MQM are not that simple. Even if the MQM returns to the government, as it would, the relationship of trust and confidence between the two partners would never be established and it would be another phase of marriage of convenience that both the parties need to satisfy their constituents, at least publicly.
It is being reported that the warring gangs belonging to all the parties, including the PPP, MQM and ANP, already have a bank of hostages in Karachi, people who have been kidnapped and are slaughtered or killed, bagged and presented to the other party as a tit-for-tat response, and this turf war is not going to end, whether the MQM enters the coalition or not.
Thus the Karachi situation is a cooked up affair, a political war of nerves which is being played out between the government coalition partners but in the process the entire city has been paralysed and the economy of the country held hostage.
In this context when Interior Minister Rehman Malik claims that target killings will stop at 2am in the morning, it becomes obvious that either he has control over the triggers or he is just bluffing. Either way, the result is negative for the PPP.
Meanwhile, Karachi is bleeding and now the business community, along with the ANP and MQM in the past, has demanded that the Army should be called out to control the situation.
What this means is that the Army would again be dragged into politics. The first casualty of an Army decision, yes an Army decision to intervene, would be the PPP government. If that happens, it would be natural that the next mission of the Army would be to stop the free fall of the economy and that would entail a virtual or physical takeover of the government.
The PPP will thus never agree to an Army intervention in Karachi but it is also not willing to surrender Karachi to the MQM. The fight thus goes on and it all depends on how the super decision makers of the PPP handle the situation, which obviously is getting out of their hands fast.
Altaf reveals real reasons for Karachi troubles
