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Published 19 Dec, 2005 12:00am

KARACHI: APC members to join in anti-dam rally

KARACHI, Dec 18: The Karachi chapter of the APC’s action committee, Sindh, has decided to participate in the December 22 rally against the Kalabagh Dam project which will be taken out from the Quaid-i-Azam mausoleum. The decision was taken at a meeting of the committee at Idara Noor-i-Haq on Sunday with Birjees Ahmad in the chair.

The committee, comprising representatives from PPP, JI, JUI, JUP, PML-N, PML-Qayyum, as well as Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf, Pakistan Jamhoori Party, Mohajir Qaumi Movement, and Shehri Haqooq Committee, deliberated upon its one-point agenda, i.e. to force the government abandon the Kalabagh dam project.

It expressed the view that the dam issue was a conspiracy to divert the nation’s attention from real issues. “Gen Musharraf’s statement, that any ruler resorting to hinder the dam’s construction would be removed by Punjab, is a conspiracy to pit provinces against each other,” it observed.

The meeting adopted a resolution that asked the army to go back to the barracks and leave the decisions of national importance up to politicians.

It was acknowledged that water was the country’s requirement and developing more reservoirs was in the national interests. However, the decision about how and where the reservoirs would be built should be left with the Council of Common Interests, Senate, National Assembly and other representative institutions.

The committee reminded the rulers that raising the issues that could lead to disunity of the nation, particularly when Nato forces were present in Kashmir, was not in the interest of the country.

LABOUR LEADERS: Representatives of different labour organizations on Sunday criticized supporters of the Kalabagh Dam project, and announced holding of protest rallies in all major cities of the country against the ‘anti-Sindh and anti-people’ project.

In a joint statement, Nisar Shah of the Labour Party, Saleem Raza of the National Trade Union Federation, Mr Sherbaz of the Progressive Youth Front, Ms Zohra Akbar of the Women Workers, Nawab Ali of the Movement for Labour Rights, Yunus Rahu of the Bhatta Mazdoor Mahaz and Nasir Mansoor of the Labour Education Foundation said that workers throughout Pakistan would resist attempts to execute the Kalabagh Dam project and would extend all support to the forces which were opposing the government’s efforts in this regard.

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