اردو
  • Siraj demands KP-Fata merger by Dec 31

    JI March File photo JI March

    Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) Emir Sirajul Haq on Tuesday warned the government to ensure the merger of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) before December 31.

    The JI chief, while addressing a long march to Islamabad protesting the delay in the KP-Fata merger, said there would be a much larger sit-in if their demand was not met by the deadline.

    Siraj said the government is being "extremely insensitive" about the problems faced by residents of Fata, and had left them helpless at the hands of local political agents. "The political agent in tribal areas is more powerful than Mughal kings," he said.

    "If the laws in Fata are so good, they should be imposed across the country. Otherwise the laws of Pakistan should apply to Fata as well," he said. He said that the people of Pakistan were unaware of the difficulties of Fata's residents and demanded an end to injustices against them.

    Earlier, the long march led by the JI protesting the government's slow progress on a proposed merger between KP and Fata reached Islamabad Tuesday morning.

    The march, which was joined by thousands of JI supporters and Fata residents, set out from Peshawar's Bab-i-Khyber on Dec 11 seeking to exert pressure on the federal government to revoke the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) and merge the tribal areas with KP before the next General Election.

    These steps are part of the Fata reforms which have been discussed for years, but were formally enshrined in the National Action Plan in December 2014 after the Army Public School attack.

    While addressing the protesters today, JI KP Emir Mushtaq Ahmed Khan said that while people around the world were demanding secession of various states, the people of Fata were demanding a permanent inclusion in Pakistan.

    He claimed that the 2017 census had under-counted the population in Fata and accused the government of promoting extremism in the area by preventing its merger with KP.

    Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Khursheed Shah told the sit-in that despite the political consensus against the FCR, the government was not making any efforts to revoke the draconian law. He said that the PPP fully supports the demand for Fata's merger with KP.

    "We will ensure the merger happens before 2018," Shah said, adding that this was the last chance for the government to move for the merger. "The government is scared of the merger," he claimed.