Uzair Baloch was in Dubai when he was extradited after being arrested for violating immigration laws and money laundering. The Sindh police was looking for him. “When they finally got the clearance to go and arrest him in Dubai, he disappeared,” says chief minister Qaim Ali Shah. But the Rangers claim to have arrested him now, “when he was secretly trying to enter Karachi.”
Uzair says he made a deal to become an approver, and has been debriefed in secret for six months. While in detention, he said his group had contacts with more than 200 police officials, including two senior DIGs, “who shared our profits”. He has lost weight, more than 20 kilograms, and looks very pale. “We controlled the entire police mechanism of the South district, especially postings,” he claims. “When I had to move out of Lyari, I did so in police protection.”
Concerns about the “criminalization of Karachi Police” have been raised every now and then, and there are claims that hundreds of political workers and activists from all the various political parties in the city have been inducted into the force. But the Sindh home minister disagrees. “Yes we have had an issue with criminals entering into the force,” says Suhail Anwar Siyal, “but to ridicule the entire police force, which actually operated against Uzair Baloch in Lyari, is absurd.”
Will his statements incriminate Asif Zardari?
There are 156 reports against Uzair Bloch registered in various police stations of Karachi.
The relationship between the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and his Peace Committee, or Amn Committee, was complex. “It was PPP leaders who came to me after Rehman’s killing in 2009,” he said in a post-arrest interview. “They promised me two seats in the provincial assembly in return for fighting against their rival party MQM.” They thought they could win five more National Assembly constituencies if they had a “militant wing”, alleges Uzair. “I accepted the offer.”
The allegation is denied fiercely by the PPP. While some of them had known him, they say they had no deep ties with Uzair.
Violence in Karachi had surged after the PPP came to power in Sindh in 2008. “The PPP and the MQM are equally responsible for the killings,” said Uzair, alleging that his group of 700 armed men protected the PPP’s interests. “I complied with orders from the People’s Party leadership,” he told Rangers.
But Qaim Ali Shah, a veteran People’s Party activist and the chief minister of Sindh since 2008, says he has “neither seen him nor met him”. News reports on television flash pictures of Uzair with PPP leaders. The PPP says meeting him, being in the same photograph, or attending an event with him, does not prove the kind of criminal ties they are being accused of.
In Landhi jail, where he has been kept in high security, Uzair says he does not want to see a lawyer. “There is nothing to defend,” he says. “I want to accept what I have done and I will tell the truth.”
There are questions about this change of heart. “My husband is being used by everyone,” his wife Samina said, “including the PPP.” She told me she thought her husband was “safe” with the Rangers. On February 8, she petitioned the Sindh High Court to allow family and lawyer access to Uzair. Samina told the court she had not seen him since he was arrested at Dubai airport in December 2014, when they were on their way to Muscat.
An Iranian Baloch by origin, Uzair has been accused of sending his illegal wealth to Oman. He now says he received foreign funding for sabotage activities in Balochistan. “We killed people and made it look like they were killed by the Frontier Corps,” he said. A formal Joint Investigation Team will be formed to probe the matter.
Uzair does not claim taking any direct orders from former president Asif Ali Zardari, but says he was in touch with him until his chief protocol officer Bilal Sheikh “ruined our relationship”. He admits having killed him. Bilal Sheikh had died in a suicide attack in July 2013.
For some, these convenient admissions are a little too suspicious.
“He seems to be out of his mind,” says Sindh Information Minister Maula Bux Chandio. “He has often said on record before that the PPP does not support him. We never supported his criminal activities.”
PPP sympathizers believe Uzair Baloch’s confessions are a part of a larger scheme against the party. It is not clear if his statements will incriminate Asif Zardari. “He would send envoys to me to get the job done,” he says.