At first glance, the MQM offices--located in the lower middle-class suburb of Mill Hill in north London--look like those of any other political organisation. But on the first floor of this four-room house is a plethora of electronic gadgets--video mixing equipment, music systems, sound recorders and computers, one of which is linked to the Internet.
Former education minister of Sindh and MQM leader Mohammad Abdul Jalil says the reason for the MQM's appeal in Pakistan lies in its intelligent and ingenious use of communication technologies for political propaganda. MQM critics too concede this.
Altaf Hussain's strategy is to keep in touch with his constituency by addressing public meetings in Karachi from London--over the telephone. All that needs to be done is to connect the receiving end to a public address system. Sitting at the London end of operations, he monitors the speeches preceding his and even checks with the crowds if they can hear him. Thereafter he launches into his long, at times rhetorical but generally stirring, speeches.
The video footage of the meetings arriving from Pakistan is mixed with shots of Hussain, seated in London, addressing the crowds. In fact, the MQM has fine-tuned this strategy to enable him to simultaneously address 10 to 20 meetings. "Such simultaneous teleconferences were recently held in the US," says Jalil.
In an attempt to check the power of the MQM, the Pakistan Government banned the use of mobile phones in Karachi. MQM's London leaders claim that federal officials have been monitoring calls to and from the UK round the clock and promptly disconnecting the line when Hussain is detected making speeches. The MQM now resorts to brief messages or routes messages to other cities in Pakistan or abroad from where they are sent to Karachi.
The MQM's teleconferences, its intense lobbying exercises and its plans to shift to a new 5,000 sq ft office beg the question, where's the money coming from? A poster in the MQM Office reads: "Don't push the Mohajirs to the wall. Or else, 1971 will be repeated." On being asked · whether this is a threat to break up · Pakistan, Hussain's curt reply is that it is the - government and 'feudal' elements of Pakistan who are bent upon denying equality to the Mohajirs. As for Indian support, he says, "Neither have they approached : us, nor have we asked for it."
Placards carried by MQM demonstrators decry "extra-judicial killings" in Pakistan and liken Benazir Bhutto to Hitler. But just about every MQM poster, banner and video seeks to build and sustain a tremendous personality cult. Hussain is referred to as "Qaid-e- Tehrikh" (Father of the Movement) a la Mohammad Ali Jinnah's title, "Qaid-e- Azam" (Father of the Nation). With the rapid advances in information technology, his stature among the Mohajirs only promises to increase.
