KARACHI, May 6: Central leaders of the Pakistan People’s Party have castigated the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, as well as the provincial and city governments, for demolishing old villages in Karachi and Hyderabad. They have also claimed that the MQM’s move to celebrate Jashn-i-Lateef was a facade to cover up its anti-Sindh and anti-people polices, adding that the people of Sindh could not be deceived by such deceits.
The PPP leaders strongly condemned, what they claimed, killing of three persons during the demolition operation carried out in Sikandar Goth, Karachi, by the MQM-led city government on Friday.
In a statement issued here on Saturday, they termed the MQM a ‘collaborator of the military regime’ because, according to them, “it had betrayed the people of Sindh on the issues of Greater
Thal Canal, NFC Award, etc. and was acting as an agent provocateur by raising a hue and cry over the military operation in Balochistan while remained part of the military-led regime that has been carrying out the operation. It has also buckled under on the Kalabagh Dam issue, besides the matter of provincial autonomy.”
Leader of the opposition in the Sindh Assembly Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, Taj Haider and Nawab Yousuf Talpur severely condemned the demolition campaign and brutal police action against the affected residents of Sikandar Goth.
“Allah’s land cannot be made a domain and monopoly of the cohorts of the ruling crime mafia. A house to live in is the fundamental right of every Pakistani. The state has to ensure this right, especially for those who do not have the resources to buy land or travel long distances to their places of work,” they argued.
They deplored that the government, while spending billions freely on facilitating the travelling of those having luxury cars, had never spent a single penny on alleviating the miseries of those living in old villages and katchi abadis. Instead, the helpless villagers were being brutally killed, they added.
They recalled that in 1995-96, when the PPP government needed to clear alignments for building roads in the highly sensitive Lines Area, those having houses on those alignments voluntarily accepted to be relocated. About a thousand houses, part of an Imambargah and a mosque were demolished without using a single policeman.
“It is sad that hundreds of plots reserved for those to be dislocated had been misappropriated.
Even, the land that had been reserved as alternative place for the demolished Imambargah and mosque has not been spared.” The PPP leaders advised police not to act as ‘mercenaries’ and reminded them that the acts of terrorism that had left 328 policemen dead had been sponsored by the same elements who were now in the present coalition.
Mr Khuhro condemned the uncalled for behaviour of the police against MPAs Makhdoom Jamiluz Zaman and Ms Sassui Palejo.
Meanwhile, PPP legislators Rafiq Engineer, Nasreen Chandio , Shama Mithani and Sajid Jokhio have condemned the demolition of old villages by the city government, and remarked that the action resembled those resorted to by the Israeli government against Palestinians.
JAMAAT-I-ISLAMI: The Jamaat-i-Islami has warned the city government to refrain from demolishing colonies the way the Israeli and Indian armies do in their occupied areas.
MNA Mohammad Hussain Mehanti, Dr Merajul Huda Siddiqui and other JI leaders, who participated in the Namaz-i-Janaza of the protester, Rafique Ahmed, who was killed during the violence on Friday that followed the demolition of houses in Sikandar Goth, strongly condemned the role of the city government and law-enforcement agencies in tackling the situation.
Addressing the mourners, the JI leaders accused the city government of demolishing katchi abadis to sell the precious lands to ‘builder mafia’.
They demanded that the case of Rafique’s murder be lodged against Sindh governor and home minister as they were directly responsible for his killing.
Amir of the JI Sindh Dr Mumtaz Memon, while talking to the affected residents of Sikandar Goth, condemned the demolition drive as an illegal act termed it ‘the worst kind of state terrorism’.
He demanded an impartial probe into the demolition of Sikandar Goth and the death of three people during the demolition drive, besides the killing of a protester.
LABOUR BODIES: The Labour Party of Pakistan, National Trade Union Federation, Movement for Labour Rights, Labour Education Foundation and Women Workers Helpline, as well as the Progressive Youth Front and Residents Welfare Association Gadap Town, in a joint statement issued here on Saturday, strongly condemned the demolition of villages in Sindh, adds PPI.
They said that a particular group was bent upon rendering real heirs of Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai homeless. They said this conspiracy would be resisted and the workers and village people would jointly foil the evil designs of the forces that were behind the razing of villages.
“This group, on the one hand, has been bulldozing villages of the followers of Shah Latif Bhitai and, on the other, rubbing salt on their wounds by celebrating Jashn-i-Latif,” they said.
