Sirajul Haq reiterates demand of FATA, K-P merger

Says tribal people will have to lay siege around Islamabad if their demands are not fulfilled

MOHMAND AGENCY: Jamaat-e-Islami leader Sirajul Haq has said if the federal government fails to grant lawful rights to the people of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), the tribal people would be forced to lay a siege around Islamabad and the provincial capital Peshawar.



Senator Haq was addressing a large public meeting at Mohmand Agency on Tuesday at which he was accompanied by JI provincial Senator Mushtaq Ahmad Khan and JI Fata leadership.

Senator Haq has demanded regulations at check posts in Fata and said these should be made after consultation with the tribal people  adding: "Fata people should be respected at the check posts instead of being humiliated as tribal people have fought in Kashmir in the past and have freed Kashmir from various attackers, and whenever Pakistan needed them, they will fight for Pakistan against the enemy."

He demanded an end to Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) and basic facilities of education, health and jobs and merger of Fata into Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) adding that FCR is a British era draconian law and that the state should create jirga’s to address grievances and questioned why the chief justice was working under the British law instead of the Holy Quran.

He also said that rulers have divided the country geographically for their own business and demanded that CNIC’s of tribal people be unblocked.



At the gathering he also said that missing persons should be brought before the court instead of being kept in extrajudicial detention, he demanded the opening of cellular networks in the agency and added that if these were not opened within a month they will start a protest movement in the agency.