To the other side: 342 schools in FATA to be given to K-P govt

Their employees will take salaries from latter starting July 1


Mureeb Mohmand June 17, 2016
Their employees will take salaries from latter starting July 1. PHOTO: FILE

SHABQADAR: At least 342 government-run schools in Fata will be handed over to the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government starting July 1.

During a meeting in Peshawar, the handing over of schools was discussed between education directors from Fata and K-P. An official in the FATA Secretariat education directorate told The Express Tribune the schools and their 2,612 employees, mostly teachers, will be handed over to the K-P government.

Matter of boundaries

He added all these schools were constructed in the de facto tribal areas, but now fall in settled districts. For instance, 200 schools are in Frontier Region Bannu, 42 in Mohmand and others are in FR Tank, FR Peshawar and FR Lakki Marwat. All these schools will be given to the K-P government to be dealt with as per the settled districts they now fall under.

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The official said these institutes, run by the FATA Secretariat in the past, will now work under the K-P education department. Salaries and other necessary matters of these employees will be managed by the provincial department.

Change of hands

However, this shift will create a vacuum in Fata. About this, the official said there is already a shortage of teachers in Fata. Therefore, he added these posts will be filled for those schools where there is a high rate of enrollment but fewer teachers.

He further said most of these [342] schools were officially handed over to the K-P government in the past, but the latter failed to devise a proper mechanism for employees. However, he maintained the necessary structure was created at a high-level meeting of the K-P chief secretary and Fata additional chief secretary. “Now the record of the employees has been transferred to K-P.”

Not acceptable to all

On the other hand, the landowners of the schools and teachers working in them summoned a meeting, deciding to the matter at the high court. Mohmand Agency ANP President Nisar Mohmand, at a press conference in Shabqadar a few days ago, said they will not accept the decision as locals had given their lands for Fata’s schools, not K-P.

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He added the move would push down the Fata schoolteachers’ grade in K-P as the government did not have a proper service structure for employees.

Nisar Mohmand said areas declared de factor were a part of Fata where tribespeople were settled since centuries.

In Mohmand, 42 educational institutes of Lower Mohmand Agency were handed over to Charsadda in 2011. However, the government failed to manage the institutes and employees were still drawing their salaries from Fata accounts.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 18th, 2016.

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