MANSEHRA: Members of local bodies on Monday warned that they would begin street protests if the Balakot hydropower project didn’t employ residents.

“The 300-megawatt power project is being executed on more than 8,000 kanals of the land acquitted by the administration but even then, the local youths are being ignored for recruitment,” local councillor Mohammad Shakeel Awan told a function here.

The event was attended by the chairmen and members of all 48 village and neighbourhood councils of Balakot tehsil.

The participants resented the delay in payments to landowners and employment of non-locals for the project.

They announced they would block the Mansehra-Naran-Jalkhad Road for an indefinite period if the government didn’t fulfil its promise of meeting their demands made at the time of land acquisition.

Mr Awan said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had already acquired over 8,000 kanals of land for the project.

“Our graveyards and agriculture fields will be submerged in waters but our youth are being ignored by the project executing agency for appointments,” he said.

Another councillor said the 880 megawatt Suki Kanari hydropower project was being executed upstream of the Balakot hydropower project in the Kunhar river which couldn’t end the deprivations of the locals and bring prosperity in their lives.

The Pakhtunkhwa Energy Development Organisation had begun the execution of the Balakot hydropower project in March this year after the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council approved $750 million for it.

Published in Dawn, December 27th, 2022