THATTA: Several hundred people took to the streets of Thatta and held a sit-in near Makli Park on Tuesday to raise their voice against what they described as “unfair and motivated” delimitation ahead of the 2018 general election.

Traffic on the National Highway remained suspended during the course of the protest which lasted over one hour.

Activists belonging to various political parties, including Pakis­tan Peoples Party (PPP), nationalist groups and civil society organisations took part in the protest.

They assembled at Makli bypass before marching through various streets and holding a demonstration at Ghulamullah Chowk raising slogans against the recent delimitation. The sit-in at Makli Park — the junction between Thatta and Makli town — disrupted normal traffic on the highway.

Former chairman of Jhoona UC Fida Hussain Nahyo, chairman of Dumani UC Ghulam Hyder Shoro, Thatta district council member Gul Hassan Shoro, Ghulam Shoro, Abdul Sattar Meerakhor and other public representatives spoke to the participants.

They expressed their strong reservations over the new delimitation and criticised Thatta officials of the Election Commission of Pakistan.

They alleged that the “unfair and motivated” changes were aimed at benefiting certain stakeholders that feared their defeat in the election. The leaders threatened to intensify their protest if the previous delimitation of Thatta district constituencies was not restored.

Chairmen and members of various Thatta UCs and leaders of PPP’s local chapter have taken strong exception to the fresh delimitation.

They have been mobilising their voters for several days to get it reversed. A few days back, a joint statement issued to the press described the new delimitation as an attempt to serve the interests of dominating political circles. It termed the move “pre-poll rigging”.

The noted with concern that the only National Assembly constituency, NA-237, was converted to NA-232 with the inclusion of three provincial assembly constituencies without making any changes to the original limits of NA-237.

Similarly, the PS-84 constituency has been converted to PS-77 Thatta 1 carving out its four tappas (administrative units) — Thatta, Tanka, Khakhar Hala and Haleji — and including it in the constituencies of Ghorabari and Mirpur Sakro.

They held that the bifurcation of major tappas consisting of six UCs was bound to cause enormous problems to the voters of the constituencies.

It was also noted that the election commission had included four UCs — Bijhora, Dumani, Jhoona and Faqir Jo Goth — in PS-78 while the voters’ list of Kalri, Jungshahi, Chattochand and their dehs were shifted from PS-77 to PS-79 Thatta-III.

The public representatives vowed to move the judiciary if their reservations were not addressed in a timely manner.

Published in Dawn, March 14th, 2018