EVERY street and corner of Karachi has a lot of colour and vibrance to offer, but there is a noticeable dearth of greenery in the metropolis. This is because little to no attention has been paid to environmental improvement of the city. However, a young face has thrown his hat into the electoral arena to achieve exactly that; turn the blues of this city to green.

Ahmed Shabbar, who is contesting independently from PS-110 in Karachi with the electoral symbol ‘roots’, which symbolise his environment-heavy manifesto, will be taking on another, more notable independent candidate, lawyer and activist Jibran Nasir, as well as Syed Najmi Alam of the PPP, PTI-backed Bilal Jadoon and PML-N’s Babar Anwar.

A physics student-turned-engineer, Mr Shabbar is contesting the election with the idea of ushering a ‘green’ revolution.

“This election is my first step towards building the ideology of green politics in the country. A lot of young people are a part of my campaign, so far wherever we have gone to ask for votes, it’s always the young lot to understand the ideology first. So, by the time 2029 comes, environment would be an integral part of Pakistan’s politics,” he told Dawn.

He believes that the environment or geographical area where humans are born not only determines their language, skin colour and other physical attributes, it is also responsible for the livelihood of the entire population, which means it needs to be preserved and cared for.

“Those born near the ocean or water bodies will most probably depend on fishing as a source of their livelihood. Those born in plain areas would be agriculturalists. Those born in the mountains might earn through dry fruits via fruit orchards or mining, and those born in the cities will take on jobs available in the urban space. Such distinct local economies go on to collectively account for our city, provincial and national economy,” he explained.

Mr Shabbar, who is a founder of Pakistan Maholiati Tahaffuz Movement, a campaign initiated to advocate for climate emergency, has built a seven-point election agenda based on an enviro-human-centric ideology where there is a recognition that humans are as much a part of nature as any other being or thing.

“Our ideology is ‘Nature First’ because it is the foundation of everything, whether it is our identity, the livelihood we earn, our economy and also foreign policy or global cooperation,” he said.

Professionally, Mr Shabbar worked as a Mechanical Designer Engineer at Aga Khan University for some years. Later, he founded The Environmental, a digital media outlet which is solely focused on the climate crisis. The website produces documentaries, short clips and explainers around ecological issues. Additionally, he is the CEO of GarbageCan (Pvt) Ltd, which is a social entrepreneurship with a vision to spread awareness about waste management and sustainable practices.

“And these skewed policies are based on greed, incompetence, apathy or all of them put together,” he said.

“Our national and foreign policies are based on similar environmental points especially when we consider infrastructure projects dependent on natural landscapes such as Gwadar Port, China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), RekoDiq and other cross border treaties such as Indus Water Treaty,” he said, adding that any environmental degradation would indicate ‘skewed policies’.

“I see politics as a form of negotiations for equal distribution of facilities,” he said.

Published in Dawn, January 29th, 2024