Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: After the military has declared most parts of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) purged of militants, the chief of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-F Maulana Fazlur Rehman gets set to visit North Waziristan tribal region on Wednesday to attend a religious conference at the renowned Nizamia seminary, his party leader said on Monday.

Maulana Fazl will address the Ulema and Fozala (religious leaders and scholars) Conference in Mir Ali, a hamlet in North Waziristan. “He will be the first leader of any mainstream political party to visit the tribal region since 1991,”said Saeed Anwar, the most likely contender to contest from the tribal region for the National Assembly (NA) on a JUI-F ticket.

Earlier on Monday, while speaking to media, Fazl announced that Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) would hold a meeting in Islamabad on April 27 in which matters pertaining to the country’s political situation and the 2018 election would be pondered upon.

“The visit of JUI-F chief to North Waziristan will be a sort of political power show and to garner public support ahead of the fast-approaching general election,” Anwar stated.

He said a convoy of hundreds of vehicles would escort his party chief to North Waziristan where he would be accorded a warm welcome.

Top leadership of any national level political party could not visit the tribal region for over a decade because of spiraling violence and clashes between the security forces and militants.

However, families of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) are now being repatriated to parts of tribal region.

Anwar said the planned visit of JUI-F chief would pave the way for leaders of other political parties to visit the tribal belt ahead of the general election. He said the JUI-F has a good number of voters in the North and the adjacent South Waziristan region and the party’s chief visit would go a long way to garner public support in favour of his party in the upcoming election.

Published in Daily Times, April 24^th 2018.