Watayo Faqir is to Sindh what Mullah Naseerudin is to Turkey, Afghanistan and Central Asia. Once someone informed Watayo that his mother had gone crazy and was writhing in the dust in the city centre; knowing his mother acted oddly at times he was nonetheless surprised. Reaching home he inquired; she replied that having seen a rupee coin in the path and thinking that if she picks it up someone would claim it, the best way was to act crazy and pocket it without anyone suspecting. Watayo said, “I knew my mother would not be all that crazy without a very good reason.” What the PPP leadership terms as the policy of reconciliation is in fact a policy of capitulation for preserving their narrow personal short-term interests and has nothing to do with the welfare or benefit of the people in general and Sindhis in particular. But then nothing better can be expected from people whose politics are based on self-interest. National interest and preservation of democracy is mendaciously bandied about as the reason behind the vacillations, oscillations, dithering and capitulation of the PPP, which would shame even the most brazen politician of any country, to appease the MQM. The sole purpose behind these brazen transmogrifications is the self-interest of the elite of these two parties who do not even bother to ask their colleagues’ opinions. Syed Zafar Ali Shah, Taj Haider and Nabeel Gabol have come out openly against this ludicrous pantomime. Naturally, no one from the MQM wants to end up in a gunny bag so there has not been a squeak from anyone; any way why would the victors complain? The resentment amongst the people of Sindh is palpable and their anger at the PPP’s capitulation was expressed by the success of the strike called by the nationalist parties on August 8. Even PPP members have taken to the streets against the latest capitulation. This pusillanimous and chronic backtracking has made them an object of ridicule and derision for common people because those who forge and implement these preposterous decisions live in inaccessible mansions away from the grubby masses. This habitual volte-face along with the carefree attitude towards the views and problems of workers is isolating the PPP from whatever support that has survived. The MQM is a different entity; it is ruled from London and only absolute submission is the rule — dissenters are meted out horrible punishments. It is a party that is based on terror, oiled by terror and thrives on terror. This is how this organisation is run and there is no other way for its survival. A quote by George MacDonald (1824-1905), a Scottish poet and author, fits to a T all fascist organisations and individuals. He says, “A beast does not know that he is a beast, and the nearer a man gets to being a beast, the less he knows it.” The terrorism perpetrated after Zulfiqar Mirza’s statement left a trail of destruction in its wake because the call to teach him a lesson resulted in a score killed and properties and vehicles destroyed. This carnage was one of the sequels of the May 12 incident; there have been quite a few follow up episodes of that successful run of the show by the MQM during the Musharraf era. Oddly, no one is ready to blame the real culprits in Karachi. The much flaunted powerbase and mandate have been acquired by sowing terror. All elections are massively rigged and manipulated and all parties practice it in places where they can cow the election staff. The MQM always boasts of a mind-boggling number of votes cast in their constituencies and this they do through fraudulently stuffing ballot boxes. The number of votes that the MQM claims cannot physically be cast in the limited time period and the cumbersome procedure that is required to cast a single vote. This rigging is done to lay claim to being the majority’s representative. This comes in handy to intimidate others into submission through threats. A heavy and unhindered presence of international observers during the elections could expose this mandate farce any day. In Karachi, the mafias of warlords — that is what all the political overlords there are — rule the roost and little wonder that the violence is expanding and becoming more vicious because it is the cannon fodder that is being killed while the godfathers are safe and sound in their sanctuaries in London and Islamabad. Karachi is dying a slow death due to the insatiable greed of warlords and the ineptness of the governments. This backtracking and appeasing different warlords for retaining their right to rule to continue plundering is driving nail after nail into the coffin of the rights of the indigenous Sindhis. Ironically the PPP, which claims to represent Sindh, is not only providing ample nails but is helping in driving them deep into the coffin bequeathed to them by Musharraf and have proved more assiduous in the task of burying the rights of indigenous Sindhis for good. The PPP government, not content with disenfranchising the indigenous Sindhis in the major cities of Sindh by appeasing and giving the MQM all the clout to prosper, has now initiated plans for the new real estate bonanza for its cronies in the name of Zulfiqarabad in the Thatta region. This will bring about irreversible demographic changes, which will condemn Sindhis to relegation to a minority in their own land. This is how the PPP has exacted the ‘best revenge’ against the indigenous population in Sindh. My friend Shahab Usto, who sometimes writes in these pages, wrote to me that he wished there were a leader of Aung San Suu Kyi’s calibre to lead us out of this dark era. I replied with a couplet of Hafiz Shirazi: “Gohar-e-Jâm-e-Jam Az Kaan-e-Jahan-e-Digar Ast, Tu Tammana Za Gill-e-Koozah Garran Mee Daari. (Tis was a pearl of another universe, the Jâm-e-Jam, A folly to expect potters’ wares to be the Jâm-e-Jam.) A little elaboration of legend will help. Jamshid the Persian Emperor had the Jâm-e Jam, which was a magical seven-ringed cup filled with the elixir of immortality and allowed him to observe the universe. Aung San Suu Kyi is the ‘Jâm-e-Jam’ and ‘potters’ wares’ our lot; little wonder we are where we are. Those obsessed with accumulating pelf cannot be expected to do any good for the people. The writer has an association with the Baloch rights movement going back to the early 1970s. He can be contacted at mmatalpur@gmail.com