Chief of Muttahida Qaumi Move-ment (MQM) Altaf Hussain on Sunday tendered an apology to Pakhtuns, saying that he apologised if they felt he (Altaf) had wronged them in any way, adding that the Pakhtun-Muhajir conflict in Karachi was part of a conspiracy.
"Today, I apologise to all Pakhtuns if (they feel) I have committed any wrongdoing to them. I also urge all Muhajirs to pardon their Pakhtun brethren in case they have committed any fault to them," the MQM chief said in a telephonic address to participants of the party's Khyber Pakhunkhwa Workers Convention here at Kashmir House.
He also declared that today, there was no Pakhtun-Muhajir conflict in Karachi. He also announced that MQM would hold two mammoth public rallies in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to strengthen its roots in the province to defeat forces that had brought Urdu-speaking people and Pakhtuns on the brink of war in Karachi.
He said that both Pakhtuns and Muhajirs were migrants in Karachi and minds of both the communities were being poisoned against one another by feudal and land lords. Altaf Hussain said that both Pakhtuns and Muhajirs were the "vanguards of revolution" but feudalists and hereditary politicians were trying to drive a wedge between the two communities to stop the 'change'. "My fight for coming into power is neither for my family nor for a part of the country but for the entire middle class", Altaf said, adding that the real change in the country was possible only if Pakhtuns supported MQM in the upcoming elections.
He announced that from today MQM would focus on Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and also directed members of party's Co-ordination Committee and organisers to make preparation for the coming elections. He also announced that MQM would field its candidates on all constituencies in the country, including Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata).
He said that people in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were in trouble due to the war on terror and hoped that peace in the province would restore soon. He added that if voted to power, MQM would bring peace in the volatile province.
The MQM chief claimed that the new name of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was made possible because of his party's support, adding if political parties in the province were really sincere in changing British era names, they should put an end to the existing colonial system in the province. Referring to sectarian killings, Altaf Hussain regretted that seeds of hatred were being sown under a conspiracy between people of Hazara and the rest of Pashtun population so that the rulers could divide people and then rule them. "MQM would bring the oppressed people together and would launch a decisive struggle against the present mindset of politicians," he vowed.
MQM's parliamentary leader in the National Assembly Dr Farooq Sattar, MNAs Waseem Akhtar and Iqbal Ahmed Ali as well as a large number of the party workers from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were also present on the occasion.