HYDERABAD: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Vice President and the opposition leader in the Sindh Assembly, Haleem Adil Sheikh has alleged that that various narcotics dealers are operating their dens in the province in connivance with police officials.
Addressing the media at Hyderabad Press Club on Sunday Sheikh said narcotics were being openly sold in the whole Sindh and that extortion seeking was also happening. “The police are supervising drug peddlers in Sindh,” he alleged.
Flanked by PTI leaders Imran Qureshi, Ameenullah Moosakhail, Jansher Junejo, Ali Hingoro and others, he said, “There is a strong connection between police, narcotics dealers and criminal elements in the province.
The PTI leader said if proper and strict steps were not taken, then in the next few years the number of drug addicts in the province will increase to such an extent that it will be difficult to overcome this scourge.
Regarding the electoral reforms, he said his party will table an amendment bill for the empowerment of the election commission in the National Assembly.
Sheikh said the PM Imran Khan has already invited the political parties to discuss and prepare the electoral reforms, adding that in the past the parties which were in power did nothing for the electoral reforms.
The overseas Pakistanis should be given the right to vote as they send the precious foreign exchange to the country, Sheikh emphasized.
He said the nation had already witnessed horse-trading in the recent Senate election, adding that an electronic voting machine would bring improvement in transparency of the voting system.
The opposition leader said in Sindh there were officers in the police department like A D Khuwaja and Aftab Memon but there were also officers like Bashir Memon who level fabricated accusations and later retract. “Memon made a drama for the senate seat,” he alleged.
Memon met him and conveyed that he knew a lot about Pakistan Peoples Party’s Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari and his sister MPA Faryal Talpur, he claimed.
“Memon should have tendered resignation if something wrong was being asked from him,” Sheikh said, adding that Memon also told lies about the law minister Farrugh Naseem and adviser on interior and accountability Shahzad Akbar.
“The Sindh government is corrupt and its police stations have become torture centres,” he alleged. The recent death of a young man Babar Khanzada in police custody in Tando Allahyar district because he had refused to pay a bribe, he said.
The opposition leader claimed that the provincial rulers devoured funds for the castration of stray dogs and they were planning to buy vehicles worth Rs.24o million for the stray dogs. He added that vehicles worth Rs.40o million were purchased to kill locusts.
“The COVID-19 vaccine is not easily available. They have no money to purchase the vaccine but they have funds for the stray dogs,” he observed. According to him, the Punjab government purchased the vaccine but the rulers of Sindh were only involved in corruption.
When the Supreme Court had objected to the colour of the health card but the Sindh government had printed a picture of former PM Benazir Bhutto on Mazdoor card, he pointed out.
Sheikh recalled that he was the first person who raised a voice against the Bahria Town, highlighting that the villages of the poor people were being forcefully vacated. “The Bahria Town means Asif Zardari,” he underlined and said the PPP was behind the forceful vacation of the villages.
