April 04, 2008	Friday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 26, 1429

LARKANA, April 3: Hundreds of thousands of admirers and devotees of Bhuttos, some on foot and others in cars and luxury vehicles, are pouring in the tiny village of Garhi Khuda Bakhsh Bhutto, to participate in the 29th death anniversary on Friday of late prime minister and founder of Pakistan People’s Party Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

Top leadership of the party have already arrived in Naudero. A tent village have been set up in the village to house the Bhuttos devotees and party workers who belong to almost every nook and corner of the country including Azad Jummu and Kashmir and Northern Areas. Thousands of people from many districts of the province have arrived here on foot. People have erected tents along the roads from Larkana to Naudero and Garhi Khuda Bakhsh Bhutto to welcome the caravans, who carry tricolour party flags and raise slogans of ‘Jeay Bhutto’ , ‘Zindah hay bibi Zindah hay’.

Police have made elaborate security arrangements for the occasion in the tiny village under the guidance of Z. A. Bhutto mazar committee and local PPP leaders.

The main programme of the day would take off at Garhi at 11 pm where renowned poets of the country would pay tribute to the leadership of the charismatic Bhuttos, said Asghar Shaikh, information secretary of the Larkana chapter of PPP.

PPP co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and top party leaders would make speeches from 12:00pm till 2:12 am, the time when Z.A. Bhutto was hanged, and observe two-minute ‘silence’ as a mark of respect for the great statesman, he said.

A documentary detailing the achievements and special moments of the lives of Z. A. Bhutto and Ms Benazir Bhutto up till her assassination would also be screened on the occasion, he said.

Provincial Police Officer (PPO) Azhar Farooqui had established a base camp in the Government College (boys) Naudero to monitor the security arrangements. About 25 vehicles of Rangers and 150 of police were patrolling the area and 15 district police officers were looking after the security, sources said, adding that police had set up pickets along the roads leading to Garhi to guide the caravans and clear the roads.