Call n°251 (from 03 October to 15 November 2002

In Punjab province, landless peasants’ organizations struggling for their rights are victims of bloody repression. Between January and September 2002, ten peasants were murdered, nine seriously injured and many others jailed or threatened. Entire villages have been besieged by the army. In 1999 the Pakistani government announced that it was going to distribute land to peasants. Yet since the movement struggling for land ownership rights, Anjuman Mazarain Punjab, started its activities in 2000, violence against peasants has increased substantially. Government agencies, in collaboration with military forces, are responsible for this brutal repression.

About one million peasants work on farms belonging to the Punjab provincial government. Most of them live under the breadline. For nearly 100 years their families have been working the same fields. In around 1900 the first peasants settled on arid lands and built the first irrigation systems. In 1919 the British government granted 40-year land leases to the families settled there. In 1958 these rights were confirmed by the Pakistani government but in 1970 the land suddenly became government trust territory.

Today the land is owned by the provincial government in ten districts of the Punjab and the twenty or so farms are run by various government agencies and often by the army to which the peasants have to give half their crops.

As if this were not enough, these institutions are currently trying to amend the terms of land leases even though they fall under several land ownership laws. They want to replace them by a system of contracts limited to three or five years, at the end of which peasants could be expelled, depending on the agencies’ or militaries’ good will.

FOR THE RIGHT TO LIVE ON ONE’S LAND

Anjuman Mazarain Punjab, the movement representing Punjab tenant farmers, is organizing resistance to these new lease contracts. It demands permanent land rights and the implementation of government promises. Since his coming to power in 1999 President Musharraf has repeatedly promised to grant 70,000 acres of land to tenant farmers working on Punjab government farms. Yet the new contracts "proposed" to them undermine their already fragile status.

Since the year 2000 this movement has become a major force of opposition in the country. It has organized gatherings and public demonstrations which it tries to keep non-violent. It was nevertheless unable to prevent some damage caused to an army farm. The repression it subsequently suffered has been totally out of proportion to that damage and has reached unprecedented levels. Many members of Anjuman Mazarain Punjab have been victims of criminal acts since January 2002 when one of them was murdered at Renala Khurd by the director of the state military farms, Colonel Mohammed Ali.

In April the tenant farmers highlighted their anger in a highly symbolic act. They decided not to share their wheat harvest with the organizations controlling the land. In mid-May two of them were murdered. Once again, active or retired army officers are suspected of being behind the murders. On 9 June 2002 a contingent of over 1,000 police officers entered locality n° 81/82 at Pirowal. Their three-hour intervention resulted in one death and three wounded. On 11 June other villages were attacked. Several towns were besieged for many days. Irrigation canals were blocked, means of communication cut off, and five tenants seriously injured. Their assailants, all members of the military, took their cut of the harvest and forced the peasants to sign new contracts.

NEW CONTRACTS IMPOSED

On 24 August a new wave of repression struck the peasants, leaving a total of four dead and 18 wounded. The villages concerned were again totally isolated and about 20 individuals were arrested. The authorities used anti-terrorist laws to justify this repression against landless peasants and were thus able to take exceptional measures without having to account for their deeds.

The villages were surrounded by the army which set up a large number of roadblocks in the area. The army blames the violence on the leaders of the peasant movements whom they accuse of being foreign agents. As in a war situation, by sealing off the area they prevent outside observers and journalists from interviewing the protagonists and investigating in the field.

The landless peasants are not prepared to lose a status that preceding generations fought to obtain. They demand that the Pakistani government keeps its electoral promises and grants them full land rights. Many Pakistani associations support them but in the current context in their country they need strong international solidarity in order to make their claims known and recognized.

Further reading:

"Peasants in revolt" 24 pages, published by the Network for Consumer Protection (Pakistan). Available on request from Réseau-Solidarité :

  by e-mail, in PDF www.fian.org

  by post, photocopy www.acpp.org

Call in liaison with:

  FIAN: Global campaign for land reform

www.fian.org

  Asian Center for the Progress of People

www.acpp.org

To write...

By letter: You can cut out or copy the letter below. This text is simply a suggestion; you can change it to suit your own style.

Don’t forget to date and sign your letter and to add your name and address.

Fax n° : 92 51 9270 205

E-mail: ce@pak.gov.pk

H.E. General Pervez Musharraf
President of Islamic Republic of Pakistan
President’s House
Islamabad
PAKISTAN

Dear Sir,

Through Réseau-Solidarité (10 quai de Richemont, 35000 Rennes, France) I have been informed of the violation of tenants’ rights in Punjab.

In your referendum campaign you promised to allot 70,000 acres of state land to landless tenants in Punjab. The distribution of agricultural land is indeed necessary for the fulfilment of these peasants’ human right to feed themselves.

However, when the tenants in the area started to organize in Anjuman Mazarain Punjab and demand that your promise be fulfilled and land distributed, they met with repression.

I urge you, Mr. President, to take the necessary and effective measures to

  provide the tenants with titles for the land cultivated by them

  put an end to the harassment of the peasants’ movement

  prosecute the murderers of tenants .

Please keep me updated on the measures you take in this regard.

Yours faithfully,

(signature)

(name)