Re: Foundation of MQM
As for the point about zia bringing him back, the whole thing makes sense, otherwise how else can a cabbie come back and become a party head of a powerful mafia, he was obviously given alot of support by the 'agencies' which later haunted him.
I don't find it hard to imagine that he could come back and quickly make a large political movement. The ground reality is that by the 80s Karachi's Muhajir community had become disillusioned with the religious parties that they traditionally supported. The religious parties only maintained Muhajir support because the other political parties were viewed as being dominated by ethnic groups that were trying to limit the Muhajir community.
Altaf Hussain, in other words, was able to offer something new that a lot of people in Karachi wanted. An ethnically focused political party catering exclusively (at the time) to the Muhajir community.
Sindhis had the PPP to struggle for them. Punjabis had the PML. The Jamaat-i-Islam tried to struggle for all Pakistanis. The Muhajirs had no party for themselves.... they would have backed anyone from their community who set about to make a new party for them.