HYDERABAD, Nov 17: The Sindh Democratic Forum (SDF) believes that free and fair elections under the caretaker setup put in place by General Musharraf will be unthinkable, observe SDF leaders at a meeting on Friday.

The meeting chaired by Abrar Kazi said the people who comprised the caretaker setup were the very people who had held 2002 general elections, which had been declared as the most fraudulent and unfair elections of Pakistan’s history.

The SDF speakers expressed disappointment over Gen Musharraf’s unilateral decisions, which had plunged the country even deeper into the quagmire.

The imposition of emergency, dismissal of more than 50 senior judges of higher judiciary, clampdown on media, crackdown on lawyers, civil society activists and political parties over dissent had created confrontation between the government and the judiciary, media, political parties and people.

Above all, despite several promises that he would appoint a neutral caretaker government, which would be acceptable to all people Gen Musharraf had in practice only replaced one set of wooden pieces with another, the speakers remarked.

Outright rejection of the interim setup by all the mainstream political parties and civil society and the threat of elections’ boycott were taking the nation towards another crisis from which the country would not be able to pull out without a major catastrophe, they said.

They called all the members of interim setup clones of Gen Musharraf in thought and practice and said that Muhammadmian Soomro and Nisar Memon were Sindhis only by virtue of birth.

Tariq Hameed who had been made minister of water and power was pro-Kalabagh Dam and opposed to the just claim of Sindh over the waters of Indus and Dr Ishratul Ibad who would continue as governor of Sindh was expected to safeguard all the illegal actions of his party, the meeting said.

The meeting said that there was no way out of the present morass unless the general resigned from both offices, army went back to barracks, a national government was set up to hold free and fair elections, independence of judiciary was restored, curbs on media were lifted, and the political parties were allowed to campaign freely.

SNP: The Sindh National Party (SNP) on Friday rejected the interim government appointed by Gen Musharraf and termed it as the general’s B-team.

A meeting of the party presided over by its central vice chairman Ashraf Noonari said that fair elections under this setup were impossible and demanded that the interim government must have non-political and impartial people.

The meeting decided to launch a movement against the imposition of emergency and for the restoration of true democracy, independence of judiciary and media and the release of arrested lawyers and political activists.

The party would launch a signature campaign on Nov 19, paste 10,000 posters on walls and distribute 20,000 handbills against the government actions, the meeting said. In addition, the party would hold a series of demonstrations across the province with effect from Nov 20.

The signatures would be sent to the UNO, international human rights organisations, European Union and Commonwealth, the meeting said and welcomed Benazir Bhutto’s statement refusing to work with Gen Musharraf.