Daily Times

Sir: On Thursday, the National Assembly (NA) created history by passing the 31st Constitutional Amendment Bill 2017, thus paving the way for the much awaited merger of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA)  with Khyber Pakhtunkhwah (KPK) province.

The bill seeks to amend Article 1 of the Constitution, which defines the country’s territory and mentioned FATA as a separate entity along with the other four provinces. Alongside this, Articles 51 and 59 are also to be amended, which specify the number of seats allocated to each of the federating units in the Senate and National and Provincial Assemblies. Once the bill is passed by the Senate and endorsed through a resolution by KPK Provincial Assembly, the present strength of the Senate will be reduced to 96 from 104 and that of the NA brought down to 336 from 342. This is because FATA will no longer have separate representation in both houses of the Parliament.

It is also commendable to mention, according to the reports in the media, that Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi did not waste a moment and speaking in the House and also afterwards addressing a news conference thanked the opposition parties for their cooperation and votes.

A committee known as the Sartaj Aziz FATA Reforms Committee had worked for over two years and presented a report along with recommendations in January 2017 that was assessed later by the civil and military leadership. The historic bill has been passed with a consensus of the treasury and opposition members and now it has been proven that consensus can be formed on issues of national importance.

MZ Riffat

Lahore

Published in Daily Times, May 26^th 2018.