April 29, 2008	Tuesday	Rabi-us-Sani 22, 1429

MULTAN, April 28: Refusing to learn from April 14 power riots, the authorities concerned are still subjecting the city to over 12-hour loadshedding daily, causing inconvenience to citizens and huge financial losses to owners and workers of power-loom industry.

Chairman National Labour Alliance Ghazi Ahmed Hassan Khokhar deplored long spells of outages, terming it a conspiracy against Prime Minister Yosuf Raza Gillani as Multan was his hometown.

He said Multan was being discriminated against other cities like Lahore, Islamabd, Faisalabad and Gujranwala where duration of loadshedding was not more than four hours.

He said the city was suffering more than 14-hour daily power cuts in the harsh weather which could result in stronger protest than that of April 14.

He condemned the lodging of FIRs under anti-terrorism act against power-loom workers and said protest was their right. Muhammad Naeem, a resident of Dhup Sari area, said that even area around the prime minister’s residence were not spared by Mepco where the duration of outages was 12 to 14 hours.

Muhammad Amin Sahi, the acting chief engineer of Mepco, said the company was not generating power but it was only a distributing agency, unable to control loadshedding. He said loadshedding was carried out according to Pepco schedule.

POWER RIOTS CASES: Leadrs of power-loom workers who were accused of inciting violence on April 14, resulting in heavy damage to public property have alleged that police were sabotaging dialogue between district administration and labourers.

Following the power riots, 47 people were arrested while FIRs under anti-terrorism act lodged against 55 nominated and 1,500 unidentified people.

An anti-terrorism court declared three office-bearers of the Power-looms Association, Abdul Khaliq Qandeel, Bashir Ahmed Pehlwan and Saeed Ahmed, proclaimed offenders on April 24, while issuing orders to confiscate the property of the accused.

“On one hand we are negotiating with district administration and police while on the other we have been declared proclaimed offenders,” says Khaliq Qandeel, General Secretary of Power-looms Association.

He said although administration had assured them that innocent workers arrested on April 14 would be released, police were still conducting raids on labourers’ houses.

He said fearing raids the workers were forced to spend nights away from their houses. He said a majority of arrested workers were only earning hands of their respective families.

He said many workers were not coming to units fearing arrests which had brought their families on the verge of starvation.

He said Mepco authorities were violating the agreement under which they were bound to carry out loadshedding according to the schedule.