Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Senator Farhatullah Babar on Saturday called for close scrutiny of the proposed FATA reforms in the Parliament and also urged to revisit the Afghan policy for implementing the reforms package.

“There cannot be peace and progress in tribal areas without peace in Afghanistan and it calls for revisiting the country’s Afghan policy and reining in non-state actors as precondition for the success of any social, political and economic reforms package,” he said.

He was speaking at a symposium organised by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) on FATA reforms, titled ‘FATA reforms: Move forward and not back’ at a hotel in Islamabad on Saturday. The symposium was attended by Member Parliaments (MPs), social activists, faculty members and researchers.

The speakers were of the view that instead of tall claims there was a dire need of practical measures to resolve the issues of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and of FATA reforms.

The critical reform areas include rehabilitation of displaced families, transferring presidential powers with respect from tribal areas to the Parliament, representation of the tribal people in the Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) in the 2018 elections and bringing the proposed local bodies election laws and Riwaj and Jirga Act before the Parliament, Babar said.

He also question how the promised 10-year development plan for FATA would be carried out. The two percent of divisible pool of NFC for FATA amounts to a huge outlay of nearly 600 billion rupees during ten years. It is critical to put in place a mechanism that is transparent, competent, participatory and accountable to prevent wastage, corruption and vested interests, he said. The role of the civilian agencies, under strong oversight, in carrying out the infrastructure and development projects must be clearly defined and the militarisation of development discouraged, he added.

He questioned the title of chief executive to the head of the authority responsible for implementing the 10-year development package saying that the words ‘referendum, ‘Chief Executive’ and ’90 days’ had acquired certain notoriety in the political lexicon of Pakistan and must be avoided.

The nomenclature chief executive is intriguing and double edged and brings to mind how General Musharraf played havoc with the country under the rubric of chief executive.

He said that if the tribal ‘riwaj’ and jirga as alternate dispute resolution mechanism were to be institutionalised then the route adopted must be parliamentary legislation and not left to the discretion of the president alone. The formation of jirga, its powers, appeal process and implementation of its decisions must be in conformity with norms of human rights and dispensation of justice.

While welcoming the extension of jurisdiction of High court and Supreme Court to the tribal areas, he said that this should be done forthwith without waiting for a decision on other elements of the reforms package. He said that there already was consensus as the KP Assembly, the Peshawar High Court, the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and tribal people had demanded that the jurisdiction of superior courts be extended to tribal areas.

Meanwhile, Haji Adeel from Awami National Party (ANP) said that the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) government actually was not willing to merge FATA into KP or give it the status of province due to fear of defeat in the KP Assembly.

Female speaker Saba Gulfar highlighted the involvement of the bureaucracy in the independent commission would be a big hurdle in the implementations. In the report it was recommended that a large proportion of work to be assigned to bureaucracy and its old structures. Gulfar blamed for inefficiency and misuse of funds in this approach.

Later, HRCP Editor Najum Din told Daily Times that the government did nothing as per agreements it made for the IDPs. As per the HRCP, investigation, he said they (IDPs) were still passing through severe difficulties as there are lack of educational and medical facilities where the IDPs are being resided. The camps provided by the government and forces, are in very poor condition.

They also facing issues during the rehabilitation process, Din said adding the amount allocated for this purpose was not spent completely on the construction of the residences, schools and other public welfare institutions. The absence of NDRA centres also aggregated the IDPs problems, he added.