[Peace-discuss] Fw: [socialistdiscussion] Another mass meeting of peasants in Pakistan

[unionyes]

An eyewitness activist report from Pakistan.

David J.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "farooq tariq " <farooqtariq at hotmail.com>
To: "Socialist Discussion " <socialistdiscussion at yahoogroups.com>; 
"socialist pakistan " <socialist_pakistan_news at yahoogroups.com>; "resistence 
peoples " <PeoplesResistance at googlegroups.com>; "saape list " 
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Sent: Sunday, March 29, 2009 10:02 AM
Subject: [socialistdiscussion] Another mass meeting of peasants in Pakistan


> Dear all,
>
> Another mass meeting of peasants was organised in Lahore Benghali Military 
> Farms today on 29 March at Jallo Park. Over 700 attended the peasant 
> convention organised by Anjman Mozareen Punjab. This was the largest 
> meeting of peasants in the area for years.
>
> They demanded the ownership of the land they are cultivating for over 100 
> years. At present, the land is occupied by the Military Farms 
> administration.
>
> The peasants came to the convention raising red flags and slogans for 
> ownership. They came on their tractor and trolies. The convention was 
> addressed by the leaders of AMP, some of them came from other districts. 
> Also Labour Party Pakistan leaders spoke and expressed their solidarity 
> and total support for the ownership campaign.
>
> Mehr Abdul Sattar, general secretary AMP, Nadeem Ashraf of Renalkhurd, 
> Shabir Choudry of Depalpur AMP, Abdul Ghafar of Kulyana Military Estate, 
> Mian Ashraf and Mohammed Hanif of AMP Lahore and several other peasant 
> leaders addressed the gathering and declared that the campaign will 
> continue till it meet the success and peasants become the ownership of the 
> land.
>
> Labour Party Pakistan women secretary Nazli Javed, Maqsood Mujahid member 
> LPP EC and myself spoke at the gathering and expressed their total support 
> for the campaign.
>
> This was the fourth large gathering of peasants during the last two 
> months. Earlier such peasant conventions were held at Renalkhurd, Depal 
> Pur and Kulyana Estate where over 10000 have already participated. They 
> are demanding from PPP government to fulfill their promise of granting 
> land ownership rights. Benazir Bhutto promised the peasants in writting 
> that PPP will hand over this state land to the peasants when it will come 
> to power.
>
> Over 68000 acres of land in different districts of Punjab is been occupied 
> by Military Farms administration. The land is been main cultivated by 
> tenants who had been  promised by successive governments to give this land 
> to them but failed to implement it.
>
> AMP was the first peasant organisation to offer resistence to Musharaf 
> dictatorship when they tried to evacuate them by deception. The AMP 
> launched a movement unprecedented in Pakistan history during 2002, 2003. 
> This led to the arrests, false cases, killings and injuring of many during 
> the resistence. The women played an important role.
>
> The AMP has decided to re launch the movement of land ownership.
>
> On 17-18 April 2009, a two days peasant conference will take place in 
> Okara Military Farms. It is expected that over 20,000 will attend the mass 
> rally on 17 April.
>
> Today, I warned the Zardari government of another long march b y workers 
> and peasants if the demand for land ownership is not accepted till the end 
> of  April this year. I also asked the chief justice to take a sue motto 
> notice of the situation.
>
> We demanded from Nawaz Sharif that the land belong to Punjab government 
> and it must decide for land ownership of the tenants.
>
> A revolutionary wave is erupting among the Mozareen of Punjab at present. 
> It will lead to another round of mass resistence to the present government 
> on a class issue this time,
>
> Report by: Farooq Tariq
> *** This Message Has Been Sent Using BlackBerry Internet Service from 
> Mobilink ***
>
>
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