QUETTA: Mir Ghaus Baksh Bizenjo, Governor of Baluchistan, has assured the people of the province, that the popular Government installed in the province … would help remove miseries of the common man who in the past were a victim of deplorable neglect and exploitation. He regretted that the people of Baluchistan have always been denied self-rule since the creation of Pakistan and said that the dictatorial regimes were to be held responsible for such a state of affairs. The Governor … said that it was for the first time in the history of the country that popular Governments directly elected by the people had been set up at the Centre and in the provinces.

[Meanwhile, as reported by a staff reporter in Karachi,] The short inaugural sessions of the Assemblies of the four West Pakistan Provinces will begin this morning [May 2] … at Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta. While Assemblies of the NWFP, Punjab and Sind meet after a lapse of almost 15 years, it will be for the first time that elected representatives of Baluchistan shall have their first Assembly meeting in Quetta. Reports from four Provincial Capitals say that there was unusual enthusiasm on this historic occasion. In Quetta and Peshawar, this is particularly so because of President Bhutto’s popular decision to appoint majority party Governors in the two provinces and the installation of NAP-JUI Governments.

Published in Dawn, May 2nd, 2022