KARACHI: On Sunday, a protest march against extended loadshedding in the old city areas was held by Lyari residents, including women and children, with the participation of Faisal Edhi of the Edhi Foundation.
After traveling through several roads in the sweltering heat, the procession arrived at the Karachi Press Club (KPC) from Ath Chowk. Faisal Edhi had earlier momentarily joined the demonstration in Lyari.
Speaking to the media on this occasion, Mr. Edhi stated that the Edhi Foundation’s mortuaries were full of bodies and that several people in the city had died from what was believed to be heatstroke. He said that the administration was “misrepresenting” the facts when it claimed that just “12 to 13” individuals had perished.
According to him, the majority of the victims had been transported to the mortuaries from the areas where the locals had endured hours of excruciating load shedding.
According to Faisal Edhi, corpses from places where residents are experiencing excruciating power outages have been transported to mortuaries.
He insisted that compensation be given to the victims’ heirs and that FIRs be filed in cases of such deaths.
Later, Sajjad Soomro, MPA for Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf, joined the demonstrators at the KPC.
Leaders of the non-governmental organization Lyari Bachao Tehreek, including Sabir Baloch, Parveen Naz, Bashir Baloch, and others, addressed the demonstrators at the KPC and stated that they had experienced load shedding for up to eighteen hours during the previous four months.
They stated that the outages had made people’s mental suffering worse and wrecked young people’s futures because they were unable to even study for tests.
According to the speakers, during the course of the previous five days, 1,076 persons in Karachi have died from what is thought to have been heatstroke, with the majority of these deaths taking place in areas where load shedding lasting up to eighteen hours was in effect.
They added the Edhi Foundation has also verified the fact.
As part of their protest movement, the demonstrators threatened to set fire to electric meters throughout the city and requested that the KE’s license be revoked. They also warned of the consequences of not paying bills.
