Mazdoor-Kissan rally: Pakistan's 'blue collar' demand cut in military budget

Speake­rs demand restru­cturin­g of public utilit­ies, worker­s be given a stake in to increa­se produc­tivity.

LAHORE: The state should consider cutting expenditure on the Armed Forces rather than privatising public-sector businesses, several speakers at a Mazdoor-Kissan rally said on Saturday.

Demanding an end to privatisation of public-utilities, they said that management of Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA), Pakistan Railways (PR) and Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) should be restructured and workers be given a stake in their respective organisations to increase productivity.

Workers Party Pakistan’s Dr Aasim Sajjad Akhter pointed towards the unequal distribution of agricultural land and industry in Pakistan had been central to the state’s obsession with national security, adding that the military was the biggest land-owner in the country. he was of the opinion that a shift in policies from focusing on national-security to welfare of the people would require the military to surrender its business interests in banking, cement, real estate and transport sectors.

Dr Akhter said land reforms should be implemented and privatisation of public sector bodies be stopped. A pamphlet, containing a list of demands, was distributed at the rally which said that agricultural land holdings should be capped at 25-acre per family, for canal irrigated, and 50-acre per family, for rain-fed.

The rally marched from the City railway station to Lahore Press Club, through McLeod Road and Abbot Road. WPP president Abid Hasan Minto and vice president Yousaf Masti Khan addressed the participants in front of the press club.

Minto said the WPP had recently lodged petitions in the Supreme Court seeking a bar on election expenditure and implementation of land reforms. He said the bar on spending would encourage people of modest means to contest elections.

Addressing the rally, Yousaf Masti Khan demanded an end to the military operation in Balochistan and said that the insurgents should be brought to the discussion table, led by civilian leadership. Masti added that most of the missing persons in Balochistan belonged to poor households, adding that wealthy sardars and their families were mostly unaffected by the unrest.

Talking to The Express Tribune, PWC general secretary Khushi Muhammad criticised the provincial government for not allowing trade unions in factories with less than 50 workers. He said the right to form unions should also be extended to agricultural workers. He said the AMP had yet to be recognised as a workers’ union even though it was leading a movement on behalf of tenant farmers for over a decade.

AMP Sargodha chapter president Hamid Gill said his association had joined the rally because it shared WPP’s slogan of social and economic justice.

The rally of more than 1,500 people included WPP members from several districts of the province and representatives of Pakistan Workers Confederation (an alliance of six trade union federations), Railways Workers Union (open line and workshops), Pakistan Telecommunications  Limited workers union, Labour Qaumi Movement, Anjuman Mazareen Punjab, Katchi Abadis Alliance and National Students Federation.