GWADAR: Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP) chief Sardar Akhtar Jan Mengal said on Sunday that people of Balochistan were not against the development process in the province, including the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project, but would not accept the development that would harm the Baloch identity in any way.

Speaking at a public meeting in Panjgur to pay tribute to ‘martyrs’ of Panjgur, he said that $45 billion of the CPEC funds were being spent on projects in Punjab and Sindh and only $1bn was being spent on a few projects in Gwadar, including the port, international airport, a power project and the Expressway.

“The projects under way in Gwadar in connection with the CPEC are being executed only to facilitate Chinese companies,” he said, adding that the ground reality was that the people of the area were still deprived of even potable water, education and health facilities.

He said his party never opposed development of Balochistan, but it wanted jobs for the youths of the province.

“We will accept those development projects which provide employment opportunities to people of Balochistan besides providing drinking water, education, health and other facilities.

“We are not in favour of a typical development which poses a threat to the identity of the Baloch people,” he said.

He dispelled the impression that tribal Sardars and Nawabs were against development in their areas and claimed that they only wanted the beneficiaries of the development to be the people of Balochistan.

“There is no Sardar or Nawab in Turbat, Gwadar and Panjgur then why Makran has still not been developed?” he asked.

Sardar Mengal said that if the demand of protecting the rights of the people of Balochistan was a sin, then his party would continue to commit such sins repeatedly.

He claimed that his party always struggled for the rights of the people of the province and would continue to achieve these goals.

Referring to the killing of cadets in the Quetta Police Training College suicide and gun attack recently, he said that the mourning for the victims of Aug 8 suicide bombing of Quetta Civil Hospital was not finished when “we received another gift of 62 bodies of police cadets”.

He said the government claimed to have broken the backbone of terrorists and their organisations and if its claim was true then who was carrying out these barbaric attacks now?

Sardar Mengal said that youths of Balochistan had been forced to take up arms instead of pen because they had been deprived of their rights.

BNP vice president Abdul Wali Kakar, Baloch Students Organisation chairman Nazeer Baloch, Dr Nazeer Ahmed, Jahanzeb Baloch and Haji Zahid Hussain also addressed the gathering.

Published in Dawn, October 31st, 2016