HYDERABAD, Oct 16: The Sindh Democratic Forum (SDF) has said that the seven years of misgovernance has led to complete breakdown of social services and crumbling institutions in the province.

In an open letter to the chairperson of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), the SDF comprising intellectuals, writers, academics and civil society activists called upon Ms Bhutto to come to the rescue of the people of Sindh and extricate them from the difficult situation.

The forum’s convenor, Abrar Qazi and Secretary Zulfiqar Halepoto said that Sindhis had always given PPP overwhelming mandate and it was now the party’s turn to come to their rescue.

They said that the very survival of Sindhis had been put at stake and their legitimate economic and political rights guaranteed under the constitution were being usurped. Poverty ratio as documented by the international agencies and independent research institutions was at an alarming high, said the letter.

The lawlessness, misgovernance, unemployment, social disintegration, drug abuse, tribal feuds and honour killings were the direct result of power-sharing between the military rulers, an ethnic party and the feudal lords, they said.

They feared the rapid population shift from other provinces and countries to Sindh and the control of urban centres of Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Nawabshah and Mirpurkhas were moves to rig the 2007 general elections and impose a non-Sindhi chief minister on the province.

The letter saw the sale of lands, islands and other assets of the province worth trillions of rupees to the outsiders, creation of fiefdoms for assorted feudal lords, transfer of financial resources to Punjab and other provinces through NFC awards, denial of investment in development, increasing corruption and rampant violations of human rights as just the tip of an iceberg of problems.

The SDF leaders said that young Sindhi and Baloch political activists had disappeared with their families running from the pillar to post for a mostly elusive justice, a fact also exposed by a recent Amnesty International report.

They complained that Sindh had always been denied its share in water and even the LBOD and RBOD mega projects, which were meant to improve the agriculture sector, had served only to wreak havoc.

The government recently gave away two islands of Sindh to a UAE-based firm for constructing mega cities without bothering to inform or seek consent of the people.

It was an irony that the islands had been leased out by the Port Qasim Authority which itself stood on the land leased out to it by the government of Sindh, the letter said.

“The silent majority of Sindhis legitimately expects from the PPP to speak out loudly and clearly and respond strongly to the injustices heaped on people in the distorted federal set-up,” the leaders said.

The leaders urged Ms Benazir Bhutto to take a firm stand on the province’s sovereignty as ordained in 1940 resolution, rule of law and independent judiciary, rights of provinces in the federation, repatriation of outsiders, end to feudalism and urban terrorism, restoration of the old status of Hyderabad, return of provincial assets to Sindh, total control over oil, gas, coal and other minerals by the Sindh government, protection of Sindhi language and cultural heritage and protection of human rights specially women, marginalized groups and minorities.