Summary Protesters demonstrated outside Insaf House, demanded immediate removal of PTI Karachi leadership
KARACHI: (Dunya News) – Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) workers on Sunday protested outside Insaf House in Karachi and demanded immediate removal of the leadership of party’s city chapter. The workers were furious at the crushing defeat of the party in the local body elections held yesterday, reported Dunya News.
Unable to bear the loss in Karachi’s local body polls, PTI workers rose in mutiny against the local leadership. A large number of ‘PTI Tigers’ reached Insaf House, Karachi, and protested against the local leadership. The workers said that the party faced a crushing defeat due to poor planning and neglecting the hardcore workers of the party.
PTI workers said that the local leadership has occupied the party. They demanded immediate removal of PTI Karachi President Ali Zaidi, MPA Khurram Sher Zaman and MNA Dr. Arif Alvi from their posts. They said that PTI Chairman Imran Khan must take the matter seriously or the party will have to suffer a serious damage.
On the other hand, 238 results out of the total 284 Karachi seats have arrived and Muttahida Qaumi Movement is already in a comfortable position with 123 seats. It is definitely in a position to bring its own mayor. Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) is in the second position while the independents are at the 3rd. PPP won 42 seats while independent candidates grabbed 33 seats.
Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) bagged 15 seats, Jamaat Islami (JI) got 12 while Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) got 9. Jamiat Ulema Islam – Fazl (JUI-F) got 3 seats while Pak Muslim Alliance won 1. Results are yet to arrive from Karachi East and Karachi West.
Also read: Celebrations underway as MQM rejoices over massive election victory
The unofficial and inconclusive results were received for Sindh and MQM has been unofficially declared as the winners of Karachi. Some influential candidates of the opponent parties such as Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Ali Zaidi, Jamat-e-Islami’s (JI) Hafiz Naeem ur-Rehman and Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) Najmi Alam failed to cause an upset in the elections.
The competition was never really a nail biter as MQM secured a landslide of votes winning 122 seats while leaving its opponents PTI, JI, PPP and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) in the dust. MQM leader Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui stated that the party has won more than 85% of the seats.
The polls were held in six districts of Sindh: West Karachi, South Karachi, East Karachi, Korangi, Central Karachi and Malir. In Karachi there were 209 union committees and 38 union councils.
PPP secured 39 seats while independent candidates managed to win 28 seats. PML-N also managed to get 12 seats while JI won 11 seats PTI’s performance was unsatisfactory managing to secure only 8 seats.
MQM’s possible candidates for Karachi’s Mayorship Waseem Akhtar and Rehan Hashmi won the polls. Akhtar won from UC-11, Aqab Jacob line while another party candidate Saadullah won from Bhatonagar, Municipal Corporation Korangi.
A war of words had earlier escalated between the parties as MQM leader Dr. Farooq Sattar had stated that both PTI and JI will boycott the election at the last moment. Farooq Sattar said that JI and PTI tried their best to postpone the local body elections but could not succeed. He showed the concern over chances of PTI and JI boycotting the election.
MQM leader had also said earlier that their party will win with heavy mandate tomorrow and will get more votes than past.
PTI and JI leaders held an emergency press conference in light of the comments by the MQM leader.
JI Karachi head Hafiz Naeem ur-Rehman said that MQM is being faced with some tough time for the first time. He said that MQM will be the one to boycott if army was deployed at the polling booths.
PTI leader Imran Ismail said that MQM is in a state of panic. “Farooq Sattar is either under pressure or he has struck some deal somewhere”, said Ismail. He claimed that the people of Karachi will give their verdict tomorrow and mayor of the city will be announced with consultation between PTI and JI.
