JI moot for Fata merger with KP

LAHORE: Representatives of different political and religious parties at a seminar on Fata at Mansoora on Wednesday called for immediate abolition of FCR and merger of tribal areas with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the light of Sartaj Aziz’s committee recommendations. 

According to a press release, a joint declaration adopted at the moot demanded that Fata be merged into KP before the next elections to facilitate provincial assembly elections there. It also called for holding local bodies elections in the tribal areas to establish grass root democracy there and for brining the tribal people in the national main scheme. 

The seminar called for a special Rs 1,000 billion package for the rehabilitation of Fata to enable people affected and displaced by army operations. It demanded equal legal, political and basic human rights for the tribal people. 

The speakers stressed the prime minister not to continue black law of the FCR on the pretext of opposition by Maulana Fazlur Rahman and Mehmod Achakzai, and added this attempt to deceive the nation won’t succeed. They said it was the PM’s responsibility to bring around Maulana and Achakzai on this point as the people of the tribal areas wanted to throw out the FCR a symbol of British rule.

JI Secretary General Liaqat Baloch, who chaired the seminar, said all political and religious parties of the country had launched a movement against the FCR from today. He said the British rulers had clamped FCR only to advance their colonial agenda but it had been in force even after 70 years of the creation of Pakistan. He said people of tribal areas had offered unmatched sacrifices for Pakistan but they considered the future of their coming generations bleak due to FCR.

Tribal elder Shahjee Gul Afridi said the entire nation supported the tribal people demand for FCR’s abolition and all the political parties endorsed this demand. He said the parties who were opposing the demand wanted to continue politics on the dead bodies of the tribal people. JI chief from Khyber P Mushtaq Ahmed Khan said that the tribal area was virtually a big jail because of the FCR. He said the tribal people had supported the Pakistan Movement and also freed Azad Kashmir. However, he said, the tribal areas were more backward than any African country. He said bureaucracy was looting the Fata resources with both hands and according to estimate this loot was billions of rupees every month.  

PTI central leader Ejaz Ahmed Ch said 15 million tribal people wanted end of their deprivations. He said the tribal people were true Pakistanis. He said IDPs had not been given the budget announced by the government. PML-Q leader Mian Muhammad Munir said the JI’s struggle for Fata reforms and for basic civic rights to the Fata people was commendable. Awami National Party leader Ehsan Wyne said the stance of all political parties on Fata issue was the same and the ANP fully supported it.