Daily Times

The federal government started on mainstreaming of Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) rather speedily early last year so that the people living there get their fundamental rights, British era’s legacy Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR)repealed and replaced with national judicial system through extension of jurisdictions of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and Peshawar High Court to these areas and more importantly FATA is merged with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in compliance with the wishes and aspirations of the majority of the residents and other facilities like rest of Pakistan. After taking a good start, it has slowed down considerably somewhat for various reasons and political considerations which amount to delaying unnecessarily the tribal areas people their long overdue but ignored fundamental rights.

Seven agencies namely Bajaur, Mohmand, Khyber, Orakzai, Kurram, North Waziristan and South Waziristan with a total area of 27,220 square kilometres comprising FATA are presently being managed by the federal government through KP Governor through a special set of laws notoriously known as the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR).Tribal areas’ population presently is about five million.

It is also worth mentioning here that the tribal people had defended the territorial and geographical frontiers of Pakistan till 2001 when Pakistan Army entered the FATA for the first time which was previously governed by the Frontier Corps.

A few attempts have been made by the federal government during the past seven decades for introducing reforms in the tribal areas.

First serious attempt regarding FATA reforms was made when Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto formed a ministerial committee under General (retired) Naseerullah Khan Babar with Abdul Hafeez Pirzada, Rafi Raza and Dr Mubashir Hasan as its members. The task given to the committee was to create a framework so that FATA can become a part of NWFP for the general election scheduled to be held in March 1977. But it was decided to take up the issue after the general elections. Unfortunately, that did not happen as planned after General Ziaul Haq staged a military coup overthrowing the democratically civilian government of Prime Minister Bhutto on 5 July 1977.

The second attempt in this regard was made 20 years later when in 1996, the government extended the franchise system to FATA so that representatives could be elected from FATA directly by the people to the National Assembly and not through selected tribal Maliks. However, though important, this step did not materialise because self-governance, partly because of Article 247 of the Constitution and partly because FATA was not a province or part of another province and as such could not, therefore, elect its representatives to a provincial assembly whose members are named as the ministers to govern the province.

Efforts to introduce the system of local bodies in FATA has, quite fortunately, totally failed. In 2002, the Local Government Regulation was extended to FATA, and in 2004, some Agency Councillors were nominated by the Political Agents. However, the system did not take off because the general public had no confidence in the nominated office-bearers who had no powers at all. In 2012, the FATA Local Government Regulation 2012 was prepared to establish local bodies in FATA.However, the Regulation so prepared was never promulgated.

The task of extending the provincial boundary right up to the international border with Afghanistan would be a major strategic undertaking and would require a careful realignment of the security infrastructure

Another serious attempt for introducing FATA reforms was made in 2006 through a Special Committee headed by Imtiaz Ahmad Sahibzada. But in the absence of significant legal reforms and concentration of all powers in the hands of political agents, there was no visible improvement in governance or development indicators.

A committee on legal reforms, headed by former Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice (retd) Mian Muhammad Ajmal was earlier also constituted in 2005 ‘to recommend modifications in FCR after public consultations across the FATA’. The Committee recommended many important amendments to the FCR. Most of these were accepted and implemented in 2011. Following the introduction of the Adult Franchise Act of 1996, the Political Parties Order 2002 was also extended to FATA in 2011 allowing the political parties to campaign freely in FATA. But in the absence of provincial elections, its impact was limited.

During its visit to all the seven FATA agencies, the committee met not only the jirgas of tribal elders and Maliks but also the representatives of political parties, civil society, traders and businessmen and journalists both from print and electronic media. The committee concluded reasonably early in these deliberations that FATA could no longer be retained as a “buffer against foreign aggression”, it must be fully integrated with Pakistan and basic legal reforms introduced to restore the people’s fundamental rights, at the same time some extraordinary efforts would be required to accelerate development of the tribal areas to bring these at par with the rest of Pakistan.

This led to the key recommendation that at least three percent of the gross divisible pool of taxes, ie Rs 90 billion to Rs 100 billion should be allocated every year to FATA for the next ten years to finance a comprehensive socio-economic plan for tribal areas. The Committee also carefully examined the option of a separate province for FATA but concluded that this was not a feasible option as the tribal areas did not have the financial resources or the administrative capacity to manage a separate province. Accordingly, the Committee concluded that the merger of the FATA with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was the only viable option for the mainstreaming of the tribal areas as such.

The next important issue was the timing of the merger option for which the FATA had to be prepared. As a minimum requirement for this purpose, the rehabilitation and reconstruction work in North Waziristan, South Waziristan and Orakzai agencies had to be completed.

Moreover, the task of extending the provincial boundary right up to the international border with Afghanistan would be a major strategic undertaking and would require a careful realignment of the security infrastructure, recruitment and training of additional personnel for the Frontier Corps and the levies. In addition, an inter-provincial consensus will be required to allocate three percent of the divisible pool of taxes to finance the proposed ten years’ development plan for FATA.

Given all these factors, the Committee accordingly recommended that the merger of the FATA with KP will require a transition period of about five years. Meanwhile, the local bodies elections can be held in FATA, and the possibility of enabling the tribal areas people to elect their representatives to the KP Assembly in 2018 could be examined.

The demand for abolishing the FCR, a legacy of the colonial era, was widespread and virtually unanimous. But many tribal Maliks wanted their traditional Rewaj system of justice through jirgas to continue because the court system in Pakistan, they opined, was ‘time-consuming, expensive and corrupt’. The Committee tried to balance these viewpoints by proposing a bent judicial system. The FCR will be abolished, and the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and Peshawar High Court will be extended to the tribal areas, but still, the traditional Rewaj system will be retained as a local dispute resolution mechanism.

The then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in November 2015 had set up a six-member committee as all previous attempts to introduce reforms in FATA had not materialised. The Committee was headed by an advisor to the PM on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz and included KP Governor Zafar Iqbal Jhaggra, Federal Minister for SAFRON Lt General (retd) Abdul Quader Baloch, Federal Law and Justice Minister Zahid Hamid, National Security Advisor Lt General (retd) Nasser Khan Janjua as members and Secretary SAFRON Muhammad Shehzad Arbab as its Secretary.

The Reforms Committee had presented its report early last year on the basis of which the federal cabinet had decided to merge FATA with KP and set up National Implementation Committee of FATA Reforms which however had not held its first meeting even after eight months. The Committee in December 2017 endorsed FATA merger with the KP.

In mid-January 2018, the National Assembly passed landmark ;Supreme Court and High Court (Extension of Jurisdiction to FATA) Act 2017; abolishing draconian Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) devised by the British colonial rulers way back in 1901 to control tribal population.

Taking a brisk start regarding steps to bring FATA into the mainstream, the government somehow has slowed down and is dragging its feet on the implementation of the reforms package and further move to do necessary legislation for the merger of FATA with KP has been criminally slowed down on petty political considerations.

The ruling party’s allies Maulana Fazlur Rahman from KP and Mahmud Khan Achakzai from Balochistan have opposed the merger though other political parties have supported it and want early implementation. Opposition to the merger by two allies has seemingly forced the federal government to slow down the procedure.

The federal government should brush aside transient political considerations on any count and get necessary legislation enacted without any further delay to ensure full implementation of the much-lauded reforms package and give the inhabitants of the tribal areas their due rights as equal citizens of the State of Pakistan.

The writer is a Lahore-based freelance journalist. He can be reached at zahidriffat@gmail.com

Published in Daily Times, April 17^th 2018.