KARACHI, 18 January 2005 — The issue of stranded Pakistanis could not be resolved due to the apathy of successive Pakistani governments. This was the consensus view of speakers at a seminar organized by the Pakistan Repatriation Council here last week.
Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh after the fall of East Pakistan have been living in camps in Bangladesh for over three decades because Islamabad has put the issue on the back burner.
The seminar asked President Pervez Musharraf to accept the chairmanship of the Rabita Trust and restart the repatriation process. It also asked NGOs and charitable organizations to arrange supply of food, medicines and other basic requirements and also hold mobile clinics in the camps housing stranded people.
Jamiluddin Aali, who presided over the seminar, said “Pakistan is their country and everyone should contribute to their repatriation and come forward with practical ideas about how to bring them back to their homeland.”
He said the repatriation of 250,000 stranded people would not have changed the demography of the city of Karachi that has a population of 15 million.
Aali praised late President Gen. Ziaul Haq, Abdullah Omar Naseef and former Chief Minister of Punjab Ghulam Haider Wyne who had initiated the repatriation process. Wyne had offered to rehabilitate stranded Pakistanis in Punjab once they are repatriated. Aali urged Punjab Chief Minister Pervez Elahi to help restart the process.
