QUETTA: A group of protestors in Pakistan’s Gwadar port city complained on Wednesday the government was not doing enough to prevent “illegal trawling” in the Arabian Sea while pointing out the practice was depriving the local residents of a major livelihood source.
According to data shared by the local fishing community, about 80 percent of people in Gwadar district are associated with the fishing industry.
However, regular trawling in the area has forced more than a dozen fish processing facilities to shut their operations.
“Despite several meetings with government functionaries, the mafia behind illegal trawling continues to fish in our waters. This has left local fishermen emptyhanded,” Maulana Hidayat-ur-Rehman, who has been spearheading a movement for the rights of the people of Gwadar, told Arab News over the phone.
According to the protesters, over 2,000 trawlers from the neighboring province of Sindh have been regularly operating near the Gwadar seashore, though the provincial administration has not done enough to stop the practice.
Gwadar has been central to the multi-billion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that promises to secure the economic well-being of the people by enhancing regional trade and connectivity.
However, its residents, along with the people of Turbat district, staged a massive demonstration against the unavailability of basic amenities, such as clean drinking water, in the area this September.
The recent protests in Gwadar have been carried out since its people want immediate and solid action to curb trawling, seek ease of doing business for local traders, and demand a removal of unnecessary checkpoints in the port city.
Speaking to Arab News, the vice president of Gwadar’s fishing community, Ilahi Buksh, said the residents of the area were now concerned about their future, though they had been previously told that CPEC was going to change their fortune.
“I am a fisherman,” he said. “This has been the only profession my ancestors have followed in the past. Unfortunately, my children will have to find another job since the sea along our city is now getting empty. The illegal trawlers have been using anti-environment nets for fishing which is like committing a genocide of sea species.”
The deputy commissioner of Gwadar, Major (r) Kabir Zarkoon, said, however, the authorities were already negotiating with the protestors and their demands would be met in the coming days.
“We have already placed additional deployment of Pakistan Marine Coast Guards to prevent illegal trawling while the government has shifted its fisheries department to Gwadar from Quetta to ease the woes of the local fishing community,” he said.
A spokesperson of the provincial administration of Balochistan Sardar Abdul Rehman Khetran maintained the newly elected chief minister Mir Abdul Quddus Bizenjo had also taken up the problems of Gwadar with Prime Minister Imran Khan.
“The prime minister has pledged to address the issues pestering the people of Gwadar on priority and negotiations are already underway with the protestors to address their demands,” he said.
