While trashing PTI’s allegations of political victimisation, Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Sunday said the anti-encroachment operation is being carried in the whole of the province, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.
The Sindh chief minister maintained that the operation was initiated on the direction of the Supreme Court. “You cannot carry out commercial activities or build farmhouses on leased out land for agriculture or livestock purposes,” he added.
Besides, he added, the 30-year lease had already expired.
Talking to media men in Sehwan Sharif, Murad Ali Shah said “If anyone wants to politicise this operation it’s up to him.”
He defended demolition of farmhouses including those owned by relatives of PTI leader and Sindh Assembly Opposition leader Haleem Adil Sheikh.
Murad said “Unfortunately, the PTI leaders not only spoke ill about him but about his late father.
“Removing encroachments is not political revenge,” he maintained, adding the provincial administration had to raze even age-old villages on the court directives.
Murad said Prime Minister Imran is doing things quite opposite to whatever he had been said in the past. “So, everybody calls him U-turn Khan,” he added.
“The latest example is he first went to the National Assembly and tabled 26th Constitutional Amendment and now has introduced an illegal ordinance. They don’t even have the numbers for getting approved a constitutional amendment,” he added.
“It looked ridiculous when I saw the ordinance last night as the government was saying that it would become effective if there was a favourable ruling from the apex court,” he maintained.
The Sindh chief minister said the Supreme Court should take a notice of it. “Why they introduced an ordinance in haste? It is because they knew that the people they were awarding tickets for the Senate elections will not get votes,” the chief minister analysed.
The Sindh chief minister said the government will soon make RO plants across the province functional.
On Saturday, the administration launched an anti-encroachment drive on the outskirts of Karachi and pulled down dozens of farmhouses reportedly owned by Haleem Adil Shaikh, who termed the action as a “personal attack” for his “outspoken and fearless” campaign against alleged corruption of the PPP.
Haleem Adil Sheikh speaks
PTI leader and Leader of the Opposition in Sindh Assembly Haleem Adil Sheikh on Sunday revealed that the Sindh government has been indulging in his political victimisation though he did not give details.
Criticising the operation against farmhouses, the PTI leader said “I have papers for every inch of the land. I have a clear conscious and a clear land.”
Addressing a news conference in Karachi, Haleem said “Sindh High Court issued a stay order about these farmhouse in August last year.”
He said Azeem Adil Sheikh is his elder brother and Tariq Qureshi is his cousin. “They are not anyone’s front men or Qulfi walas,” he taunted.