File photo of Sindh Information Minister Sharjeel Memon
Sindh Information Minister Sharjeel Memon, late on Thursday night, announced that local government elections scheduled for Jan. 15 in Karachi, Hyderabad, and Dadu have been put off for a fourth time, adding that polls would take place per schedule seven other districts.
Addressing a press conference after a meeting of the provincial cabinet, he said it had been decided to withdraw the notification on delimitations of the constituencies in Karachi as the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) had reservations over it. “They [MQM-P] are our allies in the federal government and we take the concerns of our allies very seriously,” he said, claiming the decision was not taken under any pressure from the MQM-P threatening to hamper attempts to conduct the local body polls. In a press conference earlier in the day, MQM-P convener Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui warned that the party would “fight” for its “rights” if its reservations over the local body polls were not addressed.
According to a notification sent by the Government of Sindh to the provincial election commissioner, the local body polls in Karachi and Hyderabad must be delayed due to delimitations and a lack of adequate security, while the polls in Dadu cannot occur due to the “post-flood situation.”
This is the fourth time the second round of local government elections in Sindh have been delayed. The polls were originally set to take place on July 24, 2022, but were delayed due to heavy rains and the Sindh government refusing to provide security due to the flooding. The same situation repeated on Aug. 28 and Oct. 23. The latest attempt to delay the polls evokes the recently put-off local government polls in Islamabad, where the government similarly announced new delimitations.
During his press conference, Memon stressed that even though the provincial government had delayed polls in Karachi, Hyderabad and Dadu, they would proceed on Jan. 15 in Tando Allahyar, Badin, Sujawal, Thatta, Tando Muhammad Khan, Matiari and Jamshoro. “The Sindh government is ready to hold polls in these districts and the people there should gear up for elections. No delay in elections will be made in these districts,” he added.
To a question, he said the cabinet would meet today (Friday) and decide on when to conduct the oath-taking ceremony for the lawmakers who had already been elected to the local government.
Decision criticized
Both the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have condemned the Sindh government’s decision to once again delay the local government polls, with the PTI saying it would challenge it in court. Accusing the MQM-P and PPP of uniting to deny the public’s mandate, Leader of the Opposition in Sindh Haleem Adil Sheikh said the real reason behind the delay was fear of losses in Karachi and Hyderabad.
JI Karachi spokesman Zahid Askari, meanwhile, said there was no moral or legal reason for any further postponement of the polls, adding the party would explore every constitutional, legal, and democratic avenue to counter the decision. He also alleged that the MQM-P and PPP were “colluding” in private but issuing statements against each other in public.