SUP’s multi-party moot demands withdrawal of presidential ordinance on islands

Speakers at a multi-party conference on Monday demanded of the federal government to withdraw the presidential ordinance that formed a body to govern islands of Sindh and Balochistan, saying that the people of the provinces would not allow the handover of their land to ‘outsiders’.

As part of its ongoing protest against the promulgation of a presidential ordinance on islands, Syed Jalal Mehmood Shah-led Sindh United Party held a multi-party conference at a local hotel.

Shah, Jamaat-e-Islami's central deputy chief Asadullah Bhutto, National Party President and former Balochistan chief minister Abdul Malik Baloch, Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party chief Mehmood Khan Achakzai, Awami National Party Sindh Secretary General Younas Bunairee, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl’s Taj Muhammand Nahio, Sindh Tarraqi Pasand Party chief Dr Qadir Magsi, Awami Workers Party’s central leader Yousaf Masti Khan, Sindh High Court Bar Association President Salahuddin and lawyer Shahab Usto were among the speakers at the conference.

The participants said that the islands were properties of Sindh and the federal government would not be allowed to occupy them through any ordinance as those who were auctioning Sindh’s resources were mistaken about their belief that the people of Sindh were sleeping.

It was also said that the people had not sent the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) to Parliament to keep mum over Sindh’s issues. Speakers asked the PPP if it was sincere with Sindh and said it should resist the ordinance for the formation of Pakistan Islands Development Authority (PIDA).

Leaders of various parties at the conference said the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s federal government was trying to run the country in an aristocratic manner. Islands were historically integral assets of Sindh and the federal government should not get overexcited over the issue, they advised.

They also said the constitution of Pakistan protected the geographical integrity of all the nations living in it, but the PIDA ordinance showed as if the Sindhis were oppressed and that the province could be occupied like Palestine.