Dr Farooq Sattar was addressing a protest demonstration outside Karachi Press Club, which was attended, among others, by MQM federal and provincial lawmakers and a large number party workers. People chanted slogans, venting anger against the issuance of the contempt notice.
Dr Sattar said that delimitation and verification of voters' lists was the responsibility of the Election Commission, adding that nobody could rob MQM's mandate given by the people. Stressing the need for conducting census before carving out new constituencies in the city based on new delimitation, Dr Sattar said: "Delimitation of electoral constituencies should be done in the entire country."
Reminding the audience that December 16 also marked the anniversary of the Fall of Dhaka, Dr Sattar said that pushing a segment of population to the wall resulted in incidents such as the fall of Dhaka. Referring to suggestions for conducting an army operation in Karachi, Dr Sattar asked: "What is happening in Peshawar, which has become the centre of terrorism. The Chief Justice should take suo motu notice and order a house-to-house search in Peshawar for recovering weapons."
"Everyone is calling for a house-to-house search in Karachi for recovering weapons, but nobody is speaking about areas from where these (weapons had) come in Karachi." Member of the Co-ordination Committee Wasim Aftab and Shahid Latif also spoke on the occasion.