KARACHI (Dunya News) – Federal Minister for Climate Change Musadik Malik has announced decisive action against powerful elites who have illegally built hotels, resorts, and housing schemes along riverbanks, declaring it a “war” to reclaim waterways and protect vulnerable communities.
Speaking to the media in Karachi after an event, Malik said his heart breaks when he sees how influential individuals have carved up river land to construct unauthorized structures. “These hotels and schemes become a disaster for slum dwellers during floods, wiping out poor families. In the recent floods, 800 people lost their lives—more than in many wars,” he stated.
The minister, who claimed to have traveled over 750 kilometers by road to Gilgit-Baltistan and trekked through the mountains, observed that no poor man had built hotels or resorts along rivers. “It’s always the powerful, the rich, the elites. Their hotels and resorts stand there, while the poor suffer the consequences,” he said.
Malik warned that floods do not differentiate between the rich and poor. “When floodwaters come down from the mountains, these lavish bungalows, resorts, and housing societies shatter into pieces and become deadly missiles for downstream communities,” he added.
Declaring “enough is enough,” he reiterated Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s stance that no one is above the state. “This year, everyone will see that the state will stand against those destroying the poor. This is a war, and we will not stop until all encroachments are removed from waterways,” Malik stressed.
He also emphasized the need to establish natural reserves along rivers to store and utilize floodwaters throughout the year.
Highlighting the dangers of illegal deforestation, he said cut trees swept away by floods become lethal threats for downstream populations. “Respect nature. Only trees can save us from floods. Instead of cutting them, we must plant more,” the climate change minister concluded.