HYDERABAD, Sept 10: Intellectuals and leaders of political, religious and nationalist parties have rejected the Zulfikarabad city project as an anti-Sindh plan aimed at dividing the province.

They also called for the repeal of the Sindh People’s Local Government Ordinance, 2012 which they said had been framed to appease the Muttahida Qaumi Movement.

They were speaking at a seminar on “Zulfikarabad project — destruction or progress for Sindh?” organised by the Sindh United Party here on Monday.

Mohammad Ibrahim Joyo, known intellectual, said that the PPP had failed to deliver and said the party was anti-Sindh which had framed policies only to appease its favourites. “Sindh is alive and will remain so,” he said.

Sindh United Party’s vice-president Shah Mohammad Shah said the city project would convert Sindhis into a minority. Nationalists, he said, were not against development and progress. They asked just one simple question; why the huge funds reserved for the mega project were not being spent on the rehabilitation of 23 districts battered by natural disasters.

He asked why the government had not developed the Keti Bundar project.

MQM chief Altaf Hussain had threatened nationalists over the strike call against the arbitrary local government law, therefore, if any bus was set on fire or any casualty took place the FIR should be lodged against him, he said.

The general secretary of the Sindh chapter of JUI-F, Dr Khalid Mehmood Soomro, said that people should not vote for any traitor in the upcoming general elections. Only genuine representatives of people could get just rights, he said.

He said that entire Sindh had been destroyed by disasters but rulers were hell bent on launching the anti-Sindh project. He called for a united struggle for the rights of the province.

PML-N Sindh’s general secretary Saleem Zia accused the PPP and MQM of forming a nexus in Sindh and likened it to the East India Company. The government should pay attention to existing districts or create industrial zones to generate employment for the jobless instead of launching costly and controversial projects, he said. No Zulfikarabad or Jinnahpur could be carved out because the people who had drunk from the Indus’ waters would foil all such conspiracies, he warned.

Sindh Taraqqi Pasand Party’s vice-chairman Ghulam Hyder Shahani said that the PPP and the MQM were conspiring to divide Sindh through Zulfikarbad. The 50 million people of Sindh were ready to lay down their lives for their motherland and snatch their rights like their Baloch brethren, he said.

Jeay Sindh Mahaz chairman Riaz Chandio called PPP a land mafia and said the party was busy grabbing land from Karachi to Thatta. The Zulfikarabad project would be opposed tooth and nail, he said.

The gathering adopted a number of resolutions, pointing out that the mandatory environmental impact assessment had not been carried out for the project, which proved mala fide intentions on part of the government.

According to reports of a number of international agencies, the proposed area for the city project was on earthquake fault line and could fall prey to disasters.

Instead of squandering funds on such a costly mega project, around 200 towns devastated by successive disasters in Sindh should be rehabilitated, said a resolution. A resolution said the project would convert Sindhis into a minority and, therefore, it should be shelved. It also called for decommissioning of dams on the Indus and rejected mega drains’ projects of LBOD, RBOD and NDP.

Sarwar Bhatti, Gul Mohammad Umrani, Zulfiqar Halepoto, Ismail Rahu and Inam Sheikh also spoke at the seminar.