On the call of Pakistan People’s Party local chapter, a complete shutter-down strike was observed on Thursday against prolonged electricity and gas load shedding.
Hundreds of citizens took out a rally against the outages. Citizens and PPP City Naundero leaders gathered at the municipal roundabout early in the morning, held a protest demonstration, staged a sit-in and chanted slogans against the federal government and Water & Power Minister Abid Sher Ali, alleging that he had been meting out step-motherly treatment to the people of Sindh in general and citizens of Naundero in particular. They also burnt the effigy of the minister for ordering unprecedented power outages.
Khalid Memon, Sikander Katpar, Hussain Bux Narejo, Ghulam Mustafa Narejo, Aijaz Leghari and hundreds of citizens participated in the protest. They also marched towards Shahnawaz Bhutto railway station and forced Khushhal Khan Khattak Express to stop which could not move for over half an hour in the morning and remained stuck at the station.
The protesters then reached at Sukkur-Larkana highway and blocked it from all four corners near a private petrol pump due to which all kinds of to and fro traffic came to a standstill.
While talking to journalists, Hussain Bux Narejo said that 12-hour load shedding was announced on Saturday for Naundero and its adjoining villages but in fact, 16 to 18 hours outage was being carried out regularly here to hide their massive corruption.
He said: “After every three hours, power supply is disconnected for three hours which is not only injustice but also unbecoming of an elected democratic government.” Narejo further said that citizens had been divided into two feeders which must also be finished and that entire town should be kept on single feeder, otherwise their struggle would continue.
PPP leader Khalid Memon said according to the new schedule, power would remain closed from 6 am to 9 am due to which nobody would be able to perform his or her duties and the worst affectees would be the students. He further added that gas load shedding had also severely affected the lives of the people.
PPP Taluka Ratodero president Aijaz Leghari said Abid Sher Ali had targeted people of Naundero for which Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif must quickly intervene and ensure uninterrupted power and gas supply to this town.
He said crime rate would further increase due to darkness and the farmers would be badly affected as their tube-wells would not be operated due to power outages. Leghari asked the Sindh government to take up this issue with the federal government and resolve it with immediate effect.
Shopkeepers, traders and even millers closed down their daily routine business and took part in the protest, demanding restoration of their basic right to power and gas supply. Tyres were burnt at main roundabouts which disrupted flow of traffic. Later, the protesters dispersed peacefully after about six-hour sit-in.
