KARACHI, Nov 24: The Sindh Assembly had a somewhat lacklustre session on Monday despite a violent police crackdown on ad-hoc lecturers who sought to stage a demonstration at the main entrance of the assembly building.
The demonstrators were holding placards and raising slogans demanding their regularisation when the police pounced upon them and took into custody some of them while the others took to their heels.
The lecturers were being roughed up by the police at the main entrance of the assembly building when Speaker Nisar Ahmad Khuhro called the house to order and was about to take up the agenda at 11.15am.
The issue was raised by Leader of the Opposition in the Sindh Assembly Jam Madad Ali, who drew the attention of the speaker through a point of order to the demonstration.
He said services of the ad-hoc lecturers were being terminated. They should not be made unemployed, he said, adding that making people jobless was not in the PPP manifesto.
Education Minister Pir Mazhar informed the house that a notification had already been issued for their regularisation provided they cleared a test of the Sindh Public Service Commission. He said that over 500 ad-hoc lecturers had been appointed by the previous government on the recommendations of MPAs.
Pir Mazhar drew the house’s attention towards the expiry of the date fixed for receiving applications for lecturers. But now their tests would be specially conducted to regularise them, he said.
Minister for Bureau of Supply and Prices Shoaib Bokhari drew the attention of the speaker to a law passed by the Sindh Assembly in 2005 for regularising ad-hoc doctors who had failed to clear SPSC tests, and asked the education minister to regularise the lecturers under the act to provide them relief.
Nuzhat Pathan of the PML-Q said that when she was coming to the house she saw police beating up protesting ad-hoc lecturers at the main entrance. She underlined the need for keep a watchful eye on such police officials as such a violent police crackdown was not good for the PPP government and could be a conspiracy against it.
Home Minister Dr Zulfiqar Mirza’s timely statement turned out to be an effective damage-control exercise as after his statement other members did not press the issue.
Speaking on the floor of the house, the home minister said the members’ concern was justified. He said the untoward incident took place before his arrival at the assembly. Terming the crackdown an inhuman treatment of teachers, he said he had apologised to the teachers and ordered the police to release all detained teachers forthwith. He said he had brought their leaders with him in the assembly building and now they were waiting in the chamber of Education Minister Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq for a meeting to sort out their problem after the session.
Flat-owners’ woes
Jam Tamachi of the PPP and Youth Affairs Minister Faisal Sabzwari of the MQM highlighted the plight of the middle- and lower-middle class people who had booked flats in various projects announced by builders.
They said even after clearing all instalments they could not get the flats leased as the buildings changed hands by the time the project was completed. They said the KBCA should settle all such issues to save people from exploitation by builders.
Local Government Minister Agha Siraj Durrani told the house that all those who had cleared instalments and had documents should approach him and he would address the issue with the help of the builders’ association.
Shama Mithani of the PPP, on her point of order, asked the chair to ask the media to use the new name of Nawabshah district as Shaheed Benazir Bhutto district as had been adopted by the assembly.
Sharjeel Memon of the PPP drew the attention of the speaker to a Dawn report that said the Karachi Port Trust had sold 850 acres to the Defence Housing Authority.
The land would have been acquired by the KPT from the Sindh government as such if it was not of its use, it should be transferred back to the government as the KPT had no right to sell the land directly to the DHA.
Lakhra miners
Nisar Panhwar of the MQM said the labour force employed in the Lakhra coal mines hailed from the Shangla area of Swat. He said that at a time when people and mothers in Sindh were handing over their children to orphan houses because of unemployment, local people were not employed as labourers to work in the mines.
Home Minister Dr Zulfiqar Mirza said the matter was in his knowledge and he had also taken it up with Governor Ishratul Ibad after a claim that 400,000 people from Swat had settled in the Lakhra area. He said it was in his knowledge as he himself earlier had some mines in the area and had tried different options but they did not work as people from Shangla had the necessary skills and they alone could work in the mines.
He said there were never more than 8,000 workers from Swat even at the peak demand time, and normally this number was between 4,000 and 4,500.
He said it was a very hard job and the local population, which is from the Khosa tribe, did not like to work as labourers and preferred to be employed as chowkidars.
He said he had also explained this through documents at the highest level and even to MQM chief Altaf Hussain in London that the people of Shangla had been working in the Lakhra mines for over 40 years.
Anwar Mehar of the PPP, drawing the attention of the chair to the registration of the Sukkur Medical College, requested for the regularisation of assistant professors employed there.
Humera Alwani of the PPP drew the speaker’s attention towards the spread of Hepatitis-C in Sindh with particular reference to Thatta, where she said every fifth person was afflicted by the killer disease. She said its vaccines were not available in required numbers, and asked for their provision in required numbers in all hospitals.
Zareen Majid of the MQM said there had been a steep fall in oil prices, but its benefit was not passed onto the public. She also said that in public transport more people were allowed to travel than the capacity of the vehicles.
Transport Minister Akhtar Jadoon said that when Rs2 was raised in the fare, the oil price had reached 147 dollars a barrel, which had now come down, but the diesel price was reduced by Rs3.50 only. As such, its impact on the fare would be no more than fifty paisas.
Nisar Panhwar also drew the attention of the house to the kidnapping of four Bheel community women by a rival family in Tando Ghulam Ali because one of their girls had married a person out of her family. He said two of the kidnapped girls were recovered while two others were still with the kidnappers. He demanded legal action against the suspects to recover the two women.
Munawwar Ali Abbasi of the PPP spoke about the agriculturalists who were not paid the government fixed price of rice and paddy as Pasco had not opened its centres in Shikarpur, Larkana, and Dadu which were the main cultivation areas of the crop.
Agriculture Minister Ali Nawaz Shah said the issue was also raised before President Asif Ali Zardari during his recent visit to Karachi and under his instructions, centres would be opened in a week or so.
As there was no bill for legislation, nor any privilege or adjournment motion on the order of the day, the house business remained smooth.
The speaker announced that the governor had given assent to the four bills adopted by the assembly. These bills were: the Sindh Essential Commodities Price Control and Prevention of Profiteering And Hoarding (Amendment) Bill 2008, the Gorakh Hills Development Authority Bill 2008 and the Shaheed Mohtrama Benazir Bhutto Medical University Larkana Bill, 2008 and the Sindh Goth-Abad (Housing Scheme) (Amendment) Bill, 2008.
Three items pertaining to the election of standing and other committees, nomination of a woman MPA as member of the Pakistan Nursing Council, Islamabad, and nomination of four members of the provincial assembly on the board of governors of the Sindh Coal Authority, were on the agenda. The former two were deferred till Thursday and the last one was put off for Friday.
When Speaker Nisar Ahmad Khuhro asked Law Minister Ayaz Soomro to proceed with the election of standing committees, PPP Parliamentary Party leader and Senior Minister Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq requested the chair to defer the item till Thursday as leaders of all parliamentary parties in the house had already done homework to get the committees elected unanimously. He said he would provide a list to the chair in his chamber for the announcement of the names.
Regarding the nomination of a woman member to the Pakistan Nursing Council and four members on the board of governors of the Sindh Coal Authority, the law minister sought time for consultation and the items were deferred to Thursday and Friday, respectively.
As there was no more business left on the order of the day, the speaker called it a day at 1.20pm to meet again on Tuesday at 10am.
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