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PAKISTAN: Military officers dislocate centuries-old fishing communities

June 25, 2008

[NOTICE: The AHRC has developed this automatic letter-sending system using the "button" below. However, in this appeal, we could not include e-mail addresses of some of the Pakistan authorities. We encourage you to send your appeal letters via fax or post to those people. Fax numbers and postal addresses of the Pakistan authorities are attached below with this appeal. Thank you.]

ASIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION - URGENT APPEALS PROGRAMME

Urgent Appeal Case: AHRC-UAC-143-2008

26 June 2008
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PAKISTAN: Military officers dislocate centuries-old fishing communities

ISSUES: Forced eviction; poverty; right to housing; torture
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Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that officers of a military residential area, the Defence Housing Authority (DHA), have stopped the local inhabitants from fishing in the areas close to the DHA, burned the boats, fishing nets, and their cycles, the only source of communication for fishermen, and barred them from using their ancestral jetty, in the name of beautification of the military residential area. The Sindh provincial government remains silent spectators.

CASE DETAILS:

According to the information received, the military officers of the DHA are not even allowing the inhabitants of the area to fish, claiming that the DHA holds the rights on the nearby sea as well. One old village was surrounded by military officials and the water and natural gas supplies were disconnected in March 2008 in an attempt to dislodge the 1,500 inhabitants. Through the illegal and totally unacceptable actions of the army officers some 2,000 fisher folks are under direct threat of hunger, malnutrition and poverty.

The Defence Housing Authority, an elitist residential section of military personnel in Karachi has prohibited fishing at Gizri creeks, a centuries-old fishing area, and to demonstrate the army’s strength the officers have burned several boats, arrested many people who they have kept in illegal detention centres at the DHA and severely tortured them. The fisher folk are not allowed to anchor their boats at the Gizri creek but more than 500 meters away from the creek.

The DHA authorities are patrolling the usual fishing locations and where ever they find persons fishing they attack and beat them. The fishermen moved to the Jamia Mosque in the premises of Gizri but the DHA also forced them to move from that area. From Jamia mosque they were forced to migrate to area close to Marina Club, an army officers club for recreation, and reclaimed area in the sea. From that location they were forced to leave for Gutter Bageecho. Since then the fishermen and their families have been harassed and threatened in an attempt to make them their village and sell their houses at low prices.

To date, the DHA has never entered into dialogue with the fishing community or its organization, the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum and claims that since it holds the rights to the land it also has the rights to prevent people from fishing in the adjacent sea and area around the defense housing area. On June 10, 2005, the DHA issued a notification that fishing would not be allowed in the night after 6pm and they wanted to enforce it but fisher folk resisted. In retaliation the DHA illegally arrested fishermen and tortured them in an illegal detention centre. The town Nazim (head of the town council) of Saddar, Karachi, is assisting the DHA officers by allowing them to extend their territories to other areas which are outside the DHA boundaries.

If the government does not take any action to rehabilitate the fisher folks in their ancestral villages and jetty more than 2000 persons will die due to hunger and loss of livelihood.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

The Defence housing authority was formed in 1980 by the military dictator, General Zia ul Haq. Prior to this the DHA was a Defence housing society under the Sindh provincial government and residential land was acquired at throw away prices in the early 1970s, which incidentally have not yet been paid by the military. General Zia transferred the society into an Authority by a simple ordinance and made it a supra constitutional body, which does not come under the constitution of the Pakistan. No civil law can be applied on the DHA. After becoming a supra constitutional body in the name of security of the country the DHA has started reclaiming the land all around its territories. It has acquired vast area of the sea by landfills thereby destroying several centuries old fishing villages. The army has built recreation clubs, golf clubs, hotels, and commercialized the areas reclaimed. The fishermen have been left with nothing and deprived of their basic right to life and livelihood. The DHA has even bulldozed their graveyards and built commercial structures on them. At present the fishermen have to hire the bus at the cost of Rs. 3,000 (USD 44) to take the bodies of deceased relatives to the nearest graveyard. For that, they get financial help from different trusts and welfare organizations. All this was done to create an atmosphere which could render them helpless, hopeless and compel them to flee their centuries old villages and vacate the land for further construction of palaces for military elite and other rich people.

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please write a letter to the government and concerned authorities urging them to stop the DHA to demolish old jetties of fishing and dislodging fisher folks from their villages.

Please be informed that the AHRC has also written a separate letter to the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing and Right to Food calling for intervention in this matter.

To support this appeal, please click here:

SAMPLE LETTER:

Dear ________,

PAKISTAN: Military officers dislocate centuries-old fishing communities

Name of victims; Villagers of the Machhi Mayan village, Old Gizri, Defence Housing Authority,
Karachi, Sindh province-Pakistan
Names of alleged perpetrators:
1. Brigadier Kamran Aziz, Administrator of Defence Housing Authorities,
DHA Phase 1, Karachi-Pakistan
2. Mr. Mohammad Dilawer Khan, Nazim, Saddar Town, New Chali, Karachi, Pkistan?

I am writing to you after learning about the malpractices of the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) against the fisher folk community of Karachi who have been residing there for centuries and sustaining their livelihood through fishing. I am very much shocked to know that the DHA is expanding its own prescribed boundaries through the practices of land grabbing and violating all the laws of the land and threatening the lives of poor and marginalized fishing community through militaristic methods.

The case of old villagers fishing community is that Defence housing authority, an elitist residential area of the military personals in Karachi, Sindh province, has prohibited fishing at Gizri creeks, a century old creek for fishing, and to show army’s strength the officers have burned several boats, arrested many and kept in illegal detention centres at DHA and severely tortured them. The fisher folk are not allowed to anchor their boats at the Gizri creek but have to moor them 500 meters away from the creek. The fisher folk have been residing in the nearby village, Machhi Mayan, since 18th century, and are being harassed by the military officers of the DHA to vacate their village by suspending water and gas connections of the village.

I wish to inquire as to how the authorities of a housing society have the authority to stop their free movement and their free choice for their livelihood under the civil laws. The fishermen are a very poor and marginalized community and are being dealt with by military officers as if they are enemies.

I therefore request your intervention in this matter and allow the people of the area to have their fishing rights at the centuries old places. Please also probe in to the cases of torture, illegal arrests and burning of boats and cycles by the officers of DHA and bring them before the law through the constitutional process. The grabbing of areas of land and sea through illegal methods also needs to be probed.

Yours sincerely,

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PLEASE SEND YOUR LETTERS TO:

1. General Pervez Musharraf
President
President's Secretariat
Islamabad
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 51 922 1422, 4768/ 920 1893 or 1835
E-mail: (please see-> http://www.presidentofpakistan.gov.pk/WTPresidentMessage.aspx)

2. Mr. Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani
Prime minister of Pakistan
Prime Minister House, Islamabad,
Pakistan
Fax: 92-51-9221596
Tel: +92-51-9206111
E-mail: webmaster@infopak.gov.pk 

3. Mr. Farooq Naik
Minister of Law, Justice and Human Rights
S Block Pakistan Secretariat
Islamabad
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 51 920 2628
E-mail: minister@molaw.gov.pk

4. Rehman Malik
Advisor on Minister of Interior
Room No. 404, 4th Floor, R Block,
Pak Secretariat
Islamabad
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 51 9202624
Tel: +92 51 9212026
E-mail: minister@interior.gov.pk

5. Chief Justice of Sindh High Court
High Court Building
Saddar
Karachi
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 21 9213220
E-mail: info@sindhhighcourt.gov.pk 

6. Dr. Ishrat-ul-Ebad Khan
Governor of Sindh province
Karachi
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 21 920 5043
Tel: +92 21 920 1201

7. Syed Qaim Ali Shah
Chief Minister House
Karachi
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 21 920 2000

8. Chief Secretary
Government of Sindh
Chief Secretariat,
Karachi, Sindh province,
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 21 9211946
Tel: +92 21 921950
E-mail: cs.sindh@sindh.gov.pk

9. Secretary
(Criminal Prosecution) SGA &CD Department
Government of Sindh
Sindh Secretariat,
Karachi, Sindh Province
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 21 9213873
Tel: +92 21 9213327-6
E-mail: secy.cpsd@sindh.gov.pk

10. Registrar
Supreme Court of Pakistan
Supreme Court Building
Islamabad
PAKISTAN
Fax: +92 51 9213452
Tel: +92 51 9213770
E-mail: registrar@supremecourt.gov.pk 

11. Mr. Zahid Ali Bhurgari
Minister for fisheries
Government of Sindh
Pakistan secretariat, Barrack no 51,
Karachi
PAKISTAN
Tel: +92 21 9203651
Fax: +92 21 9203652
E-mail: syed_qzs@hotmail.com

12. Ms. Nadia Gabol
Minister for Human Rights
Government of Sindh,
Pakistan secretariat, Barrack 92,
Karachi
PAKISTAN
Tel: +92 21 9207043
Fax: +92 21 9207044
E-mail: lukshmil@yahoo.com

Thank you.

Urgent Appeals Programme
Asian Human Rights Commission (ua@ahrchk.org)

Document Type :
Urgent Appeal Case
Document ID :
AHRC-UAC-143-2008
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Extended Introduction: Urgent Appeals, theory and practice

A need for dialogue

Many people across Asia are frustrated by the widespread lack of respect for human rights in their countries.  Some may be unhappy about the limitations on the freedom of expression or restrictions on privacy, while some are affected by police brutality and military killings.  Many others are frustrated with the absence of rights on labour issues, the environment, gender and the like. 

Yet the expression of this frustration tends to stay firmly in the private sphere.  People complain among friends and family and within their social circles, but often on a low profile basis. This kind of public discourse is not usually an effective measure of the situation in a country because it is so hard to monitor. 

Though the media may cover the issues in a broad manner they rarely broadcast the private fears and anxieties of the average person.  And along with censorship – a common blight in Asia – there is also often a conscious attempt in the media to reflect a positive or at least sober mood at home, where expressions of domestic malcontent are discouraged as unfashionably unpatriotic. Talking about issues like torture is rarely encouraged in the public realm.

There may also be unwritten, possibly unconscious social taboos that stop the public reflection of private grievances.  Where authoritarian control is tight, sophisticated strategies are put into play by equally sophisticated media practices to keep complaints out of the public space, sometimes very subtly.  In other places an inner consensus is influenced by the privileged section of a society, which can control social expression of those less fortunate.  Moral and ethical qualms can also be an obstacle.

In this way, causes for complaint go unaddressed, un-discussed and unresolved and oppression in its many forms, self perpetuates.  For any action to arise out of private frustration, people need ways to get these issues into the public sphere.

Changing society

In the past bridging this gap was a formidable task; it relied on channels of public expression that required money and were therefore controlled by investors.  Printing presses were expensive, which blocked the gate to expression to anyone without money.  Except in times of revolution the media in Asia has tended to serve the well-off and sideline or misrepresent the poor.

Still, thanks to the IT revolution it is now possible to communicate with large audiences at little cost.  In this situation there is a real avenue for taking issues from private to public, regardless of the class or caste of the individual.

Practical action

The AHRC Urgent Appeals system was created to give a voice to those affected by human rights violations, and by doing so, to create a network of support and open avenues for action.  If X’s freedom of expression is denied, if Y is tortured by someone in power or if Z finds his or her labour rights abused, the incident can be swiftly and effectively broadcast and dealt with. The resulting solidarity can lead to action, resolution and change. And as more people understand their rights and follow suit, as the human rights consciousness grows, change happens faster. The Internet has become one of the human rights community’s most powerful tools.   

At the core of the Urgent Appeals Program is the recording of human rights violations at a grass roots level with objectivity, sympathy and competence. Our information is firstly gathered on the ground, close to the victim of the violation, and is then broadcast by a team of advocates, who can apply decades of experience in the field and a working knowledge of the international human rights arena. The flow of information – due to domestic restrictions – often goes from the source and out to the international community via our program, which then builds a pressure for action that steadily makes its way back to the source through his or her own government.   However these cases in bulk create a narrative – and this is most important aspect of our program. As noted by Sri Lankan human rights lawyer and director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, Basil Fernando:

"The urgent appeal introduces narrative as the driving force for social change. This idea was well expressed in the film Amistad, regarding the issue of slavery. The old man in the film, former president and lawyer, states that to resolve this historical problem it is very essential to know the narrative of the people. It was on this basis that a court case is conducted later. The AHRC establishes the narrative of human rights violations through the urgent appeals. If the narrative is right, the organisation will be doing all right."

Patterns start to emerge as violations are documented across the continent, allowing us to take a more authoritative, systemic response, and to pinpoint the systems within each country that are breaking down. This way we are able to discover and explain why and how violations take place, and how they can most effectively be addressed. On this path, larger audiences have opened up to us and become involved: international NGOs and think tanks, national human rights commissions and United Nations bodies.  The program and its coordinators have become a well-used tool for the international media and for human rights education programs. All this helps pave the way for radical reforms to improve, protect and to promote human rights in the region.