Senate body holds all institutions responsible for Gadani tragedy

Senator Nasreen Jalil, the chairperson of the Senate Functional Committee for Human Rights, said on Tuesday that the Gadani ship-breaking yard fire occurred because of the incompetence of all the institutions concerned.

She called for timely compensating the families of the victims and activating and empowering the Balochistan Development Authority.

Jalil was talking to reporters after meeting held at the Sindh chief secretary’s office in connection with the Gadani tragedy.

She said committee had arrived to determine the facts and it had observed that the incompetency of all the institutions concerned was the major reason behind the tragedy and it would be wrong to blame an individual or a single organisation for it.

The Balochistan government had briefed the meeting about the fire which took place in the unserviceable vessel at the Gadani ship-breaking yard.

Jalil noted that only the families of four victims of the 26 who had died in the fire had been compensated.

She added that the Balochistan Development Authority should be activated and empowered to prevent such incidents in the future. She suggested setting up of schools, a hospital and a fire brigade office in Gadani.

She also said work at the ship-breaking yard which had come to a halt after the fire should be started so that the labourers there could earn their livelihood. Balochistan finance secretary Akbar Durrani informed the participants of the meeting that the owner of vessel had started dismantling it without obtaining a no-objection certificate from the government. He added that the vessel had the capacity to load 150,000 tonnes of oil and it had not been fully drained out when the dismantling work was undertaken. He further informed the committee that the fire had the lives of 26 labourers while people were still missing.

The secretary added that 25 bodies had been handed over to the heirs and an unclaimed body was still at the Edhi morgue.

Durrani said 50 of the 57 people injured in the fire had been treated and discharged.

Senator Farhatullah Babar, Senator Jahanzeb, Senator Mohsin Khan Leghari and Senator Nasir Muhammad, the Balochistan Development Authority chairman, and the commissioner and deputy commissioner of Lasbela also attended the meeting.

 

‘Meet the workers’

The National Trade Union Federation and Gadani Ship-Breaking Workers Union in a joint statement said if the the government and its committees were really interested in knowing what had caused the fire at the ship-breaking yard, they should meet and ask the workers there.

They welcomed the committee visit and encouraged its members to meet the victims’ families living in a village near Gadani. They demanded that the families of the deceased should be given Rs3 million each and each injured person should be compensated with Rs500,000.