KARACHI: Prime Minister Imran Khan with his party legislators and those of his government’s coalition partners in Sindh on Friday discussed future political strategy in the province. Pursuing anti-graft cases against Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) leaders, federal government-funded projects mainly in Karachi and enhanced coordination among the allied parties for effective performance and result-oriented moves came under discussion, officials and sources said.

The leaders of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and the Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA), led by Sindh Governor Imran Ismail, flew to Islamabad where they held more than an hour-long meeting with the prime minister and discussed a range of issues.

A statement issued by the PM Office after the meeting gave sketchy details of the huddle, but hinted at an increased role of the federal government and its coalition partners in Sindh’s governance matters.

“Prime Minister Imran Khan said the progress and prosperity of the people of Sindh was amongst top priorities of the government and all possible steps would be taken in that regard,” said the statement.

“The meeting discussed progress on the ongoing social welfare and development projects in Sindh. The delegates informed the prime minister about the difficulties they faced in implementation of the roadmap for the development and prosperity of the people of Sindh.”

Leaders of MQM-P and GDA flew to Islamabad to hold meeting with Imran Khan

It referred to the prime minister’s resolve when he said that the key agenda of the PTI government was eradication of corruption. The prime minister reiterated that corruption would not be tolerated at any cost because it had deprived the country of development and prosperity. He said the process of accountability across the board would be continued uninterrupted in the whole country.

The meeting was attended by Kishwar Zehra, Kanwar Naveed Jamil, Mohammad Hussain Khan, Hameed-ul-Zafar and Mohammad Rashid Khilji of the MQM-P while Dr Fahmida Mirza, Ghous Baksh Mahar, Arbab Ghulam Rahim, Murtaza Jatoi, Ayaz Palijo, Safdar Abbasi, Zulfikar Mirza and Ali Gohar represented the GDA.

Apart from the Sindh governor, Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Asad Umar, Omar Ayub Khan, Ali Haider Zaidi, Muhammadmian Soomro, Naeemul Haq, Firdous Shamim Naqvi, Haleem Adil Sheikh, Mohammad Aslam Abro, Khurram Sher Zaman, Amir Baksh Bhutto, Jai Parkash Akrani, Ashraf Qureshi, Ali Junejo and Hasnain Mirza attended the meeting from the PTI side.

When contacted, leaders of the allied parties also shared details of the meeting which could further increase the political temperature in Sindh’s politics. Among other issues which were discussed in the meeting, the leaders from all sides agreed with the prime minister to actively pursue the corruption cases against those in the Sindh government.

“Those who attended the meeting from Sindh briefed the PM on bad governance in Sindh and growing corruption,” MQM-P MPA Mohammad Hussain Khan told Dawn after the meeting.

“The PM was clear that like the centre and other provinces, corruption would not be tolerated in Sindh. It’s a very strong resolve of the government that it would eradicate corruption from all public institutions whether they are under federal or provincial government.”

When asked about discussion on any measures that could practically check or eradicate alleged corruption in the Sindh government, he said that the federal government enjoyed all those powers and authority to address this issue in any province.

“It has yet to be seen what practical solution comes out for this strategy. But it’s principally decided that the federal government would play its role for eradication of corruption in Sindh and it has all tools and authority available for practical implementation of its decision,” said the MQM-P lawmaker.

Published in Dawn, December 7th, 2019