MWM rally: security personnel lay siege to Karachi ‘red zone’

KARACHI: Security measures adopted by the government to prevent a rally of the Majlis-i-Wahdat-i-Muslimeen (MWM) from reaching the Chief Minister’s House on Sunday virtually stopped almost everyone, including pedestrians, in the city’s business and commercial hub and the so-called ‘red zone’ and it affected many other parts.

The city’s security apparatus had been at work from the wee hours of Sunday to clutch heavy containers from the harbour area to place them at the mouth of every artery that could possibly provide some passage to the Chief Minister’s House — the place where the MWM leadership and cadres had planned to go to protest against the killing of people belonging to the Shia community in Karachi.

Police put about six containers in the middle of Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Road and as many on Aiwan-i-Sadr Road, near the quarters for the Artillery Maidan police, to give some sense of protection to the inhabitants in the Governor’s House as well.

Aiwan-i-Sadr Road’s mouth near the Fountain Roundabout and all arteries near Metropole, PIDC Bridge, Hoshang Road and Clifton overhead bridge received a similar treatment.

The MWM rally was stopped near Shaheen Complex where they were allowed to congregate for a sit-in which continued till late in the night.

Although the arrangements proved fruitful for the key government offices and residences where the rulers were pleasingly relaxed, common people who had chosen the wrong time to satiate their desire for a public-like ride on a Sunday were virtually held hostage.

The people who had entered the Polo Ground in the afternoon — many of them with children — remained stuck in the middle as they were seen running helter-skelter to find certain ‘loophole’ in the perfect cordon. They, however, found a way right under the nose of police officials, but only after a couple of hours.

Fortunately, it hit with little severity because of weekly holiday, yet employees of the organisations, which remain open seven-days-a-week, were badly affected. Dawn was one of such organisations as its employees could hardly find a way after hours of roaming aimlessly outside the building. It appeared that the security planners must have seen some wisdom to block the road just before the main gate of the newspaper’s building.

The blockades on I.I. Chundrigar Road, Ziauddin Ahmed Road, M.R. Kiyani Road, Aiwan-i-Sadr Road and their arteries also affected traffic on Sharea Faisal and M.A. Jinnah Road and in Clifton and other areas.

Hundreds of policemen deployed to protect the participants of the rally or senior government officials from its possible harmful effect were seen tired late in the night and ultimately proved to be the key casualty of the whole episode.