Differences cause deferment of Tribal Areas Rewaj Bill

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly’s Standing Committee on States and Frontier Regions (Safron) on Friday decided that Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) representatives, who are not members of the committee, would be invited to the next meeting to get their point of view regarding The Tribal Areas Rewaj Bill 2017.

The committee met here at the Parliament House under the chairmanship of MNA Muhammad Jamaluddin. The committee was briefed on the bill, following which differences emerged among the members.

So the bill was deferred till the next meeting with the suggestion for further studyingand sharing it with the people concerned. The committee was informed that after enactment, the bill would repeal the FCR law in Fata as it was a longstanding demand of Fata people.

The Safron minister briefed the committee on salient features of the bill. He read out recommendations finalized by the Reforms Committee on FATA and approved by the cabinet. To a question regarding merger of Fata with KP, he told the committee there were 26 recommendations made by the FATA Reforms Committee for reforms in FATA. He said the committee had the mandate to pass or reject the bill.

The issue of tax extension to Fata also came under discussion and Fata members raised reservations over it and demanded that the government review it. MNA Bismillah Khan staged a token walkout on the decision of imposing tax in FATA and said Fata was a war-torn area and it would be an injustice with locals if the tax was not withdrawn by the federal government.

The meeting was attended by Muhammad Nazir Khan, Begum Tahira Bukhari, Iffat Liaquat, Surraya Jatoi, Aftab Shaban Mirani, Kamal Malik, Bilal Rehman, Bismillah Khan, Nasir Khan, Sheikh Fayyazuddin, Shahid Hussain, Usman Tarakai, Naeema Kishwar, Shahida Akhtar and officials of the ministry concerned.