HYDERABAD, Jan 1: The concluding session of a seminar on "Advocacy and Dialogue on Natural Resources" here on Wednesday opposed the construction of big dams and proposed that small water reservoirs should be built.

It further proposed that channels and watercourses should be lined and wastage of water be stopped. The two-day seminar was organized by the Action Aid and six other NGOs at the Sindh Museum.

The seminar said multinational companies working in the country should be directed to recruit local people. In another resolution, it was demanded that affected people of the Thar Coal Project and other projects should be rehabilitated and paid adequate compensation, release of water downstream Kotri be ensured and control of natural resources be handed over to the provinces.

In her message read by MPA Farheen Mughal, Pakistan People's Party chairperson Benazir Bhutto said it was necessary to evolve a long-term strategy to improve the lot of the people. She, however, said this could only be done through political will and farsightedness.

Ms Bhutto said the country's resources should be judiciously distributed among the provinces. She said there was no respect for law, the supremacy of parliament had become a misnomer and elected representatives had been shorn of all powers.

She said the rulers were enacting their own laws and the Constitution and parliament had therefore become subservient to them. Speaking on the occasion, the leader of the opposition in the Balochistan Assembly, Kachkol Ali, said the Balochistan Assembly had passed a resolution that unless an agreement was reached with the Centre over natural resources of the province, these resources would not be handed over to it.

The adviser to the Sindh chief minister, Mumtaz Hameed, said Sindh was facing a shortage of water since 2000 and added that a lot of rainwater was wasted. He said the government had therefore decided to construct small reservoirs to store rainwater. Sono Kangrani, Ghulam Hussain, Sadiqa Salahuddin, Khalid Ahmad and others also spoke on the occasion.