HYDERABAD, Sept 6: A member of the executive committee of the Sindh Chapter of the People’s Party Parliamentarians, Maula Bux Chandio, has alleged that government functionaries are harassing relatives in government service of elected councillors of the Awam Dost Panel to force them to switch sides ahead of the third phase of local body elections.

Talking to journalists at his residence in Qasimabad on Tuesday, Mr Chandio, who has been nominated candidate for the taluka nazim’s post by the Awam Dost Panel, said relatives of elected nazims, naib nazims and councillors were being threatened and pressurized to support the government’s favourites.

He named several councillors and their relatives serving in government departments, who, he said, had been directed to ask them to support government-backed candidates.

He said most of such complaints in Qasimabad had been received from the Water and Power Development Authority and the health department.

He alleged that PPP leader Abdul Haleem Abro’s son Allah Jurio, who worked as dispenser in the Services Hospital, and son-in-law Dr Ghulam Akbar, medical officer at the Nara special prison, were under pressure from the health services director general to support Khalid Jatoi, his brother and an aspirant for Qasimabad taluka nazim’s post. He said Mr Abro had also complained to the Election Commission.

He urged government officials to remain neutral.