QUETTA, Aug 25: The Jamhoori Watan Party (JWP), National Party (NP) and Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) have given a joint call for a shutter-down strike on Friday.

Representatives of the parties said excesses and injustice on the part of the government had forced the Baloch political leadership to give the call.

Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday, opposition leader in the provincial assembly Kachkol Ali Baloch (NP), JWP parliamentary leader Haji Juma Khan Bugti and MPA Akhtar Hussain Langoo (BNP-M) termed the strike part of Balochs' efforts for their survival.

They also said Balochs' concern over uplift programmes was justified because the federal government had planned to settle non-locals in Gwadar and other areas, which would imbalance the population ratio.

They claimed that in the Saindak copper project, Balochistan's interest was jeopardized as Chinese share was 74 per cent in the scheme whereas the federal government had 25 per cent and the province only one per cent.

The leaders told newsmen that the federal government earned annually Rs84 billions from Sui gas fields, but gave the Balochistan government only Rs5 billion in the head of development surcharge and excise royalty, that was great injustice.

They said thousands of young doctors, engineers, agriculture graduates and veterinary doctors, and master's degree holders in other disciplines were jobless.