They were targeted for allegedly allowing vaccination inside their school. PHOTO: FILE
In yet another debilitating blow to the struggling anti-polio campaign in Fata, seven teachers volunteering with an ongoing polio drive were reportedly kidnapped by banned outfit Lashkar-e-Islam, officials said on Saturday.
The teachers were whisked away two days ago for allegedly allowing polio vaccination teams inside a private school in Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency.
Nasir Khan, the assistant political agent (APA) of Bara, told The Express Tribune that the incident occurred on November 21 when anti-polio teams launched a campaign in the tehsil and that local schools had welcomed the drive despite receiving threats from militants.
Khan said that when the vaccination teams escorted by khasadar officials went to the Hira Public Model School for Boys in the Sipah area, militants kidnapped the teachers and shifted them to an unknown location. The APA identified the teachers as Qasim Khan, Samad Khan, Nisar Khan, Abdur Rauf, Kismat Khan, Sharafat and Jan Bahadur.
Political administration officials and other members associated with the polio programme blamed each other for the kidnapping, rather than working to mobilise resources for the recovery of the abducted teachers.
“It seems to be more of a personal incident rather than militancy or polio-related,” Khan added, explaining that the same teachers were kidnapped earlier by militants from Lashkar-e-Islam at the launch of election campaigns in the area, only to be released later.
He also said that tribal elders convened a jirga on Friday to secure the release of the teachers and that negotiations were still under way. “It’s our responsibility to escort teams launching the campaign,” the APA said.
When approached for comment, a health department official familiar with the matter was at first confused about the number of teachers kidnapped, but clarified that the teachers were not volunteers or in-charge of the campaign. He said that the security of the teachers is the responsibility of the political administration along with security officials, and that they should establish the writ of the government and secure teams in the area.
Unicef spokesperson Rabia Amjad agreed that it is the government’s responsibility to get the teachers back safe and sound.
The polio programme in FATA and K-P has faced stiff resistance in the shape of parental refusals, targeted attacks on polio teams and bans on immunisation in North and South Waziristan agencies after it was revealed that Dr Shakil Afridi had conducted a phony vaccination drive for the American CIA in Abbottabad to hunt down Osama bin Laden.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 24th, 2013.
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