‘We can’t go beyond peaceful protest, but we can censure government’

A 65-year-old man, Khan Muhammad Khan, has placed his worn-out chair at a corner of a tent set up along Ingle Road in front of the Karachi Press Club. The tent houses a sit-in camp of dock workers of the Bin Qasim Port where Khan Muhammad is guarding his fellow workers who are in deep slumber after a whole day of activities as part of their protest that completes 100 days on Wednesday (today).

It is a cold winter night. Draped in a grey woolen shawl which is not enough to cover his whole body, Khan Muhammad somehow manages to spend the first half of the night with nothing to do but keep an eye on inside and outside the tent. However, as the night enters its second half, he has to make efforts to keep drowsiness at bay as he frequently rises from his seat and walks around the camp. “What else can I do the whole night?”

“I keep an eye around to shield my colleagues against stray dogs and their belongings against drug addicts who roam around the camp to steal something they can sell to buy drugs,” Khan Muhammad says.

So far nothing has come out of the past 100 days of the protest. According to the old guard, the protesting dock workers are still waiting for some response from the federal and provincial governments and the authorities concerned who have been giving them the cold shoulder. “We have all our hopes from Allah, no one hears our entreaties,” says Khan Muhammad.

“All of us are poor workers who are fighting for legitimate rights,” the guard remarks, pointing at workers lying on the floor. “Fighting for rights is no less than a worship for us. We are determined to continue the protest sit-in until our demands are met by the relevant authorities.”

Days and nights

Since September 2018 when the protest camp was set up, the protesting workers have been motivating each other to remain firm. As they spend their day, one of them often rises and starts a speech reiterating their demands to motivate his fellow workers.

Day-to-day tasks at the protest camp are distributed and everyone is assigned some work which is changed on a weekly basis. Same goes for the duty to guard the camp at night, though, it is assigned to the elderly ones who are between 60 and 65 years old.

“Due to our age, we are not allowed by the younger ones among us to do the tougher tasks,” says Gul Zaman, 58, another old man at the camp.

As darkness looms after the sunset, the KPC and its surroundings become quiet with people dispersing and stalls on wheel carts moving away. The chill intensifies with the darkness forcing the dock workers to concentrate inside the tent. Following Isha prayers, they have their meals, after which the younger ones start cleaning the floor, fill water coolers, and help setting beds.

Before sleeping, the workers share among themselves minor addictives like Naswar and cigarettes. Most of them sleep inside the camp while a few could be seen lying on the adjacent footpath.

At Fajr, the old men serving as guards call the others to wake up. After prayers, the dock workers make arrangements for breakfast as smells of tea, parathas, and cakes brim the camp. With the breakfast starts another day of protest amidst hopes and optimism.

Tales of hardships

Sitting in groups, the protesting dock workers are often seen engaged in discussions on various issues. Sometime a giggle is heard when a joke is cracked by one of the group members.

In their mutual talks, they reminisce about the old good days when they worked at the port. “We would be competing with each other in terms of carrying heavy weights, sacks of grains and bags of other materials during loading or offloading of vehicles and containers” recalls 63-year-old Abdul Sharif.

“Labour contractors would come to localities surrounding Lea Market in Lyari where we lived. Muscular and healthy labourers among us would be picked for work. We would be taken care of and respected for the strenuous work. Now, they don’t need us so we are abandoned,” Sharif said.

According to him, the slogans of Naya Pakistan and Tabdeeli of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf often dominate the group discussions at the camp. “The Federal Minister for Maritime Affairs, Ali Haider Zaidi, at least should have visited us and listened to our entreaties,” Sharif laments, adding that there seems no respect for elders in ‘Naya Pakistan’ who spent their entire lives labouring at the Bin Qasim Port.

No pay since May

The protesting workers have been facing acute financial constraints as they have not been paid for the last seven months. A majority of them are unable to pay house rents and utility bills, and have had their children extruded from schools.

“We have no idea what should we do. The best part of our lives is already spent. We don’t have the luxury to move on and start from scratch. We do not possess skills, nor do we have money for doing something else such as starting our own businesses,” Sharif laments.

The dock workers are also worried about rent for the tent, chairs, and mats they had brought for the sit-in camp. “No one had thought that it would take so long, and still without bearing fruits,” says Said Kamal, a young worker.

“We would have moved on and sought other jobs, but we found it hard to leave the older ones among us alone in their struggle for getting reinstated and compensated,” Kamal said.

Left high and dry

Last week, Sindh Governor Imran Ismail inaugurated Panah Gah, a shelter home for outstationed people accompanying their patients at Dr Ruth KM Pfau Civil Hospital. The governor announced provision of facilities, including mattresses, blankets and a three-time meal, at the shelter house. The dock workers lamented that the governor, despite living a few furlongs away, had not bothered to meet them, let alone provide facilities to them.

“Why does the governor not visit us hardly a few furlongs away from his office,” an elderly protester, Muhammad Alam Khan, says. “The PTI had set a record of 123-day protest at D Chowk Islamabad during the Azadi march in 2014. We are also close to breaking that record. The government should listen to us; after all we have followed them in recording our protest.”

“Have a look at us, a majority is at the age of retirement, the age where we would be called senior citizens and respected in any civilised society. But here we are left high and dry. We cannot continue it too long. We cannot go beyond a peaceful protest. But we can censure the present government and the authorities who have thrown us on roads to face rough weather,” says Alam.

Not a long list of demands

The protesting workers only want the implementation of the Dock Workers (Regulation of Employment) Act 1974. Their only demand is treating the dock workers of the Bin Qasim Port like the workers of the Keamari port.