It is really nice news for Karachi and MQM that population of Karachi has increased to 18 million. If population of Karachi has increased to 18 million then that comes to around 12 percent of Pakistani population and 48 percent of Sindh population. So, if that is the case then why resident of Karachi are deprived of their representation according to population in Pakistan NA and Sindh PA?
At present only 24 NA seats (20 elected plus 4 for women and minority) out of Pakistan 342 NA seats are allocated to Karachi. Similarly, only 42 PA seats out of Sindh 130 seats are allocated to Karachi. Anyhow, according to population (18 million), Karachi should get 40 NA (32 elected and 8 for women plus minority) plus 63 Sindh provincial assembly seats. This number of provincial assembly seats means there would around 12 out of 100 senators from Karachi in Senate, instead of around 7 senators at present.
Plus, as Karachi gained around 4 to 5 million Pakhtuns from Pakhtunkhwa and that is around 23 percent of Pakhtunkhwa population, then Karachi should get 23 percent share from whatever money Pakhtun-khwa get allocated in National Finance commission award, as money allocated in NFC Award is mostly based on population but that population no more live in Pakhtunkhwa, rather they live in Karachi. Obviously, we should not expect that Karachi should provide facilities to all those Pakhtuns whose share of money from federation is given to Pakhtunkhwa and get spent in Pakhtunkhwa (or get stolen by people who get elected in Pakhtunkhwa). Right to spend or steal that money should be of those who get elected from Karachi. At present representative of Pakhtunkhwa steal or spend that money. Anyhow, since 23 percent of that money belongs to Karachi, that money should be given to representatives of Karachi to steal or spend.
So before anything, we should do campaigning to get seats from Karachi increased so to represent population in Karachi, and also to get those allocated NFC awards from Pakhtunkhwa transferred to elected representatives in Karachi, whoever that representative may be and in whatever way they won the election in Karachi.
Anyhow, rigging is widespread problem in Pakistan and every party gets accused of rigging by those who lose election, not just in Karachi but all over Pakistan, so we have to think of getting rid of this menace.
For instance, as for accusation of getting elected from rigging is concerned, obviously MQM, rather all political parties would claim that they got genuine votes of Pakistanis. MQM never claims that they represent any one single community; rather they vocally claim that they are the biggest representative of every community living in Karachi. Actually, they point out that because of such representation of every Pakistani community, they now hold 2 seats in Kashmir, 1 seat in ‘Gilgit and Baltistan’, spreading themselves all over Pakistan, and get thousand of votes during election in PakhtunKhwa, Punjab as well as Baluchistan.
Anyhow, complain is there, not only in Karachi but across Pakistan. Thus Pakistan needs a constitutional change to get rid of this rigging complains from all over Pakistan. The change in constitution should be that, once elected government finishes their term and interim government is formed, chief or army staff should automatically become head of election commission and army supervises election all over Pakistan. It should be such that throughout country, each polling station should have political agents from political parties contesting election in that constituency, plus armed army personals with an officer in polling booth supervising polling so that rigging do not happen. Once election time passes, each polling station should have counting in front of poling agents and army personals. After counting, the result of that polling station should get fed on internet straight from polling booth for all to see throughout Pakistan. At election commission office, people under army can tabulate the counting of individual polling stations getting data from internet (that anyone should be able to do who has access to internet) and announce the result. In this way, there would be no reason to complain about rigging anywhere.