LARKANA: Sindh United Party (SUP) Central President Syed Zain Shah said on Sunday that his party would not accept any law, whether imposed through martial law or otherwise, that divided Sindh, and urged the people of the province to remain aware of threats to its unity and very existence.
Addressing the “Wahdat-i-Sindh (Unity of Sindh) March” rally at Jinnah Bagh Chowk, he urged people to pledge that they would block the path of anyone seeking to partition the province and stage sit-ins on roads. “Let them file cases against us, fire tear gas and make arrests. Even if thousands, even hundreds of thousands, fill the jails, we will not give up on the unity of Sindh,” he said.
He described the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) as “oppressors and traitors of Sindh” and said the protest movement would not end. “We will go to every corner of Sindh and defeat them with the strength of Sindh’s youth,” he said.
Leaders berate PPP for ‘selling out province’
Zain said that, for the first time in 80 years, “outside brokers” and the “company government” had suffered a defeat in the recent struggle over water. He alleged that the same forces had unlawfully toppled the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) government, banned the party, jailed its members on fabricated cases and, most recently, ended its government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and arrested Suhail Afridi. “What they have done will come back to haunt others,” he warned.
He said the people and lawyers of Sindh had forced a decision on the canal issue in 2025 by shutting down the province’s highways. He also criticised developments in the Sindh Assembly over the past eight months, including the passage of a resolution, alleging that authorities wanted to introduce a dual local government system so that the province would have no financial, administrative or political say over powers held by the Centre.
Concerns over NFC, resources
The SUP chief alleged that the president and prime minister would cut the provinces’ share in the National Finance Commission (NFC) award from 57.5pc to 37.5pc, and then move to take control of finances, rivers and, eventually, administrative units through amendments in the provincial or national assemblies. Pakistan was a federation, he said, formed by its constituent units, which held authority over their own survival and decisions.
He accused Sindh’s “corrupt bureaucrats, politicians, MPAs, MNAs and senators” of handing everything over to Asif Ali Zardari while claiming to be coerced, describing this as a “drama” and a “deal of deception”. He said Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari or a minister would sometimes make such claims, while others would hold ethnic-based talks with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement. “We are followers of G. M. Syed, and we will not retreat from our homeland’s language, geography, the Indus River, coastal islands and lands, and we will take them back,” he said.
Shah said political parties were being banned in an effort to prop up what he called a fake system, and that political leaders had been imprisoned. He pointed to the situation in Balochistan and said Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would now see the government run from the Governor House secretariat. He accused the present rulers of “selling out” Sindh through the Special Investment Facilitation Council, handing the province’s resources to the Centre and creating an authority over Sindh’s sea. He further alleged that the PPP, together with the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, had signed agreements on millions of acres of Sindh’s land through the Green Pakistan Initiative and was rapidly changing the records of thousands of acres.
Earlier, Shah’s convoy was stopped on its way from Dokri to Larkana, with all routes sealed. He continued by motorcycle with his supporters, breaking through the barriers via Airport Road to Larkana’s Otha Chowk and then to Ataturk Tower, where the march began. It proceeded via Bakrani Road and Pakistan Chowk to Jinnah Bagh Chowk, where Shah and other leaders addressed the gathering.
Police from various stations across Larkana district were deployed at Jinnah Bagh Chowk during the march.
Published in Dawn, October 12th, 2026
