HYDERABAD, Jan 15: The Sindh Taraqqi Pasand Party has decided to launch a campaign across the province to mobilise public opinion and unite people to protect their rights.

This was announced by Nandlal Malhi and other STP leaders at a news conference at the press club here on Thursday. They said that the party would launch the campaign from Jan 22 to Feb 28.

They said the government had failed to give any relief to people during the last 10 months and was just pursuing blindly the policies and decisions of the Pervez Musharraf regime.

They said that the coastal areas of the province were being auctioned for a pittance and natural resources were being given in the control of the federal government. The urban areas had been handed over to what they described as ‘terrorists’ and the rural areas to feudal lords and dacoits, they alleged.

They said that they saw no sign of Sindh government.

They said that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement was the de facto ruler of Sindh and all important decisions about governance were being taken either at the Governor’s House or Nine Zero.

Even a principal of a college was not ready to obey the Sindh chief minister’s orders, they added.

The country was facing internal and external dangers and no government over the past 60 years had been able to make Pakistan a viable state, they said.

They governments had even failed to draft a constitution acceptable to all federating units, they said, adding that the 1973 Constitution had been amended so many times that its original spirit had been distorted.

They said that all rulers whether civilians or military had played their part in tempering with the Constitution to perpetuate their own rule. Since the inception of the country, the establishment had ruled Pakistan and civilian governments had managed to enter corridors of power through deals with it, they said.

They said that all the institutions had been held hostages and “Jiyala judges are being appointed.” Atrocities had been committed against people of Balochistan over the past nine years and neither the military nor the present civilian government had been able to dislodge Baloch people from the mountains, they said.

They said that terrorism had plagued the tribal areas and the NWFP where thousands of innocent people had been killed and maimed. Situation in Sindh was disappointing because the legal and constitutional rights of Sindhis had been trampled upon, they said.

Sindh had always faced stepmotherly treatment, forcing Sindhis to start thinking whether or not to give up the federal politics. The murder of the four member of Bhutto family had bought about a visible change in SIndhis thinking, they said.

They condemned atrocities unleashed by Israel on hapless Palestinians and urged the UNO and international community to stop the aggression. The Israeli leaders should be tried for crimes against humanity, they demanded.