Karachi awash in blood

EDITORIAL: DAILY TIMES

A typical day in Karachi begins with kidnapping and tortured or bullet-riddled bodies strewn across the city. Most days Karachi is on strike, mourning the death of its citizens and rising criminality. Why does Karachi have to rise each morning to a bloodstained day? And why is the government so helpless in restoring law and order in the city? Unfortunately there are still no answers to these questions. There appears to be absolutely no writ of the state in Karachi. The provincial government is busy passing laws to give legal cover to its controversial steps. That the plight of a commoner is of no value is reflected in the statement issued by the Supreme Court (SC) while hearing a case on the Karachi law and order situation at the apex court’s Karachi Registry, wherein it observed that the government is not serious about resolving the law and order crisis in Karachi, and that the court is carrying out a meaningless task. As usual, the hearing revealed the poor performance of the Sindh Police. According to one report, nearly 400 police officers are running crime rings in Karachi. It is a typical case of who will guard the guardians. Every day 15-20 people from all walks of life are killed. On Thursday, a doctor, a policeman, a mason, two real brothers and one uncle and his nephew were shot dead among others. Almost all of these people had no personal enmity with anyone or any criminal background. Their only fault appears to be living in Karachi where the power game has been reduced to turf wars, money extortion and now Talibanisation. In coming days, the real issue confronting the authorities would be holding transparent and peaceful elections in Karachi amidst the violence. As noticed by the SC, the people of Karachi are terror-stricken and polling under duress will result in distorted voting and violence. From the trend of killing in Karachi, where ethnicity, religious affiliations and extortion are the common causes of taking lives, peaceful elections look an increasingly unachievable task. When campaigning starts, how will peace be maintained in such a volatile climate? What about election day? Will one army soldier deployed at each polling station be sufficient? With an inadequate and thoroughly politicised police force, lacking modern policing gadgets and mechanisms, elections may mean a bloodbath of extraordinary proportions in the metropolis. Unless the government wakes up from its slumber, elections will become a problem to conduct peacefully. Interior Minister Rehman Malik is on record as saying that target killing and massacres will rise during election days. MQM and ANP are the government’s coalition allies in Sindh. They should sit down together, just like they sit in the assemblies, to find a way out of this predicament. If they can share power, they should also share the burden of Karachi’s law and order situation, and gear themselves up to get it resolved. But the substance to any such move resides in depoliticising the police force, making it autonomous and accountable for its actions to the people of the country. Out-of-turn promotions have rendered the police stooges of the power brokers. If police is not doing its job, the intelligence agencies have been equally unimpressive. It is as if the security apparatus of the country has collapsed under the weight of its own inefficiencies. The coming elections are very crucial for the country. If Karachi remains unpredictable regarding timely elections, the entire country will suffer the consequences. It is time for the government and its allies to come out of their illogical power politics and play politics for the people to achieve real democracy.