KARACHI - Sindh Bachayo Committee, a united front of Sindh nationalist parties, on Saturday unveiled the second leg of their protest and announced shutter-down and wheel-jam strike in the province on July 22 against arrival of IDPs’ influx of North Waziristan.
They also announced to stage protest sit-ins at all the national highways and aimed at closing the routes for traffic leading to other provinces on the day of shutter-down strike.
This was decided at a meeting of Sindh Bachayo Committee held with its convener and chief of Sindh United Party (SUP), Jalal Mehmood Shah at his residence in Karachi on Saturday. The meeting was attended by the representatives of 13 nationalist parties including Dr Niaz Kalani of JSQM, Mir Alam Mari of JSQM-Araiser group, Fateh Bhutto of JSM, Karam Wassan of AJP and other leaders.
Jalal Shah along with other leaders while addressing the press conference said, “The Articles 15, 18 and 23 do not serve the interest of the provincial rights so the Sindh Bachayo Committee has challenged these Articles. They demanded the federal government and all the four provincial governments, all political parties and civil society to review these Articles and permanently ban migration of people to Sindh. The Committee has written letters to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and UNHCR’s country chief about the concerns of the people of Sindh for arrival of IDPs in the province, fearing their influx may pose a threat to the peace of Sindh.”
In letter to the PM, they said nearly one million people were displaced because of Zarb-e-Azb operation. The Committee wholeheartedly supported the operation and expressed profound sympathies with the IDPs but at the same time it showed serious concern over the sheer mismanagement of the IDPs.
Shah said it was alarming that the influx of a large number of IDPs in Sindh would not be welcomed as this would jeopardise the fragile demographic balance of Sindh, they added.
In 2009, a similar operation was carried out in Swat. According to an estimate, about 400,000 people have been migrated to Sindh while half of them have permanently settled in the province. Consequently, terrorists in the garb of IDPs created their safe havens and now they have become a major reason of unprecedented wave of terrorist incidents in Sindh particularly in Karachi, they alleged.
Sindhi nationalists observed that Sindh had been accommodating the migrated populations since centuries which later on assimilated with the native people but now the situation is changed. About 37 per cent migrants constitute its total population in the province which is seriously threatening the inherited right of the indigenous Sindhis.
Sindhis have fear that a large number of these IDPs of North Waziristan will permanently settle in Sindh. They reiterated that Sindhis have all sympathies with the genuine IDPs who are suffering at the hands of wrong policies of the past federal governments.
IDPs, due to Afghan Jihad, moved to Sindh and are permanently residing here by getting fake CNICs and passports, they added.
Unchecked influx of aliens in Sindh would ultimately lead to creating a new conflict that may erupt into an ethnic warfare. Federal government and all the provincial governments should sit together and solve the migration issue to Sindh accordingly,” they cautioned.
The federal government is solely responsible and bound constitutionally to repatriate the IDPs of Swat operation and IDPs of Waziristan operation to restrict them near surrounding areas like Bannu, Tank and Dera Ismail Khan districts.
In another letter to the Country Director of UNCHR, Pakistan, Sindhi nationalists feared that shifting of fundamentalism and export of terrorism to Sindh will destabilise the whole country as well as the region.
“There is confirmed news that a large number of children, coming from North Waziristan are affected by polio virus and there is a chance of spreading of the same among the host communities,” they added.
Sindhi nationalists called upon the UNCHR to ensure implementation on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People who are entitled to have full protection to their historical entity, culture, land and resources. Being the largest majority population, the Sindhis have a right to rule which is recognised by the law and the constitution, they said.
“The Sindhis will resist, with peaceful means, if any attempt is made to dilute their majority or deny them of their right to rule or deprive them of their rights as enshrined in the Constitution and the UN’s Charter of Human Rights,” they declared.