ONLY SINDH HAS THE RIGHT OVER ITS RESOURCES

JOINT STATEMENT OF SARDAR ATAULLAH MENGAL AND ALTAF HUSSAIN

 

London – 12 January 2001

 

Sardar Attaullah Mengal, Convenor PONM and President of Balochistan National Party (BNP), and Mr Altaf Hussain, Founder and Leader of Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) while strongly lamenting the daily extraction of 800-barrel oil from Fazil Rahu in Sindh province, have stated that this oil is the wealth of Sindh and therefore, Federation has no right of looting it.  In a joint statement they said that the Allah Almighty has bestowed Sindh with the great wealth in the shape of oil, gas, water and other mineral resources.  For the past 53 years, in the name of Federation, Punjab has been exploiting these resources of Sindh, whereas, Sindh is being kept deprived of its share.  Sardar Attaullah Mengal and Mr Altaf Hussain said that in the name of Federation, the wealth generated from the resources of Sindh province is being spent on the development and prosperity of Punjab.  Sindh province is also deprived of its due share in the National Finance Commission (NFC) Award.  The people of Sindh are even deprived of clean drinking water let alone any development.  They said that only the Sindh province has full rights over the oil, gas, coal, water and other mineral resources of Sindh and the Federation has no right to loot Sindh’s wealth.

 

Referring to the Resolution No 3 presented in the public gathering of the 17 September 2000 in London, Sardar Attaullah Mengal and Mr Altaf Hussain said that the people of the smaller provinces do not consider themselves responsible for the agreements being made without their consent and knowledge, between the international companies, organisations and countries with the current Establishment, with regard to exploitation, the use of the resources, means of production and distribution in the smaller provinces -- either in the form of oil and gas, minerals or ports.   The people of the smaller provinces believe that by committing such act, the international companies, organisations and the countries are intentionally or unintentionally becoming a party to the exploitation of the resources of the smaller provinces by the Punjabi Establishment.  The international companies, organisations and countries should refrain from such acts because the poor, enslaved and unarmed people of these provinces have the right according to the International Norms and United Nations Charter to protect and defend their resources, their land and their means of production and distribution.

 

Sardar Attaullah Mengal and Mr Altaf Hussain demanded that the continued process of looting the wealth of Sindh and other smaller provinces must be stopped forthwith and the powers and resources of these smaller provinces must be handed over to the smaller provinces so that they could extract these resources for the development and prosperity of their provinces.