Ban on timber sale: KKH reopens as protesters agree to 10-day hiatus

KOHISTAN:

Forestland owners and members of the Kohistan Timber Association have agreed to end their blockade of the Karakoram Highway (KKH) after the district administration assured them of meeting their demands within the next ten days.

Residents of various parts of lower and upper Kohistan districts blocked KKH on Friday against a ban on the sale of felled trees by the provincial government under its campaign of Clean and Green Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa around two months ago.

Following the ban, forestland owners were not issued work permits by the forest department which restricted them to market the felled timber and forced them to protest.

On Friday, following a jirga decision, scores of villagers blocked the vital land route between Gilgit-Baltistan and the rest of the country against the government’s failure to lift the ban. The road remained blocked for around 20 hours and long queues of passenger vehicles and trucks could be seen stranded on the highway.

Forestland owners from Dasu, Pattan, Komela and Zaidkhar Nala vowed to continue their protest unless the government takes back its decision of imposing the ban.

They claimed around 2 million cubic feet of marketable timber had been lying on the roadside for two months owing to the restriction. Following the protest, the Lower Kohistan police detained former MNA Malik Aurangzeb Khan, Maulana Kareem Dad, Deedar Ahmed, Malik Guldad, Shah Room Khan and Mehtab Khan for violation of Section 144 which the administration had recently imposed. However, the protest leaders were released after a brief detention when protesters threatened to forcibly set them free.

On Saturday, Kohistan District Commissioner Syed Muhammad Shah, the forest conservator and police officials held parleys with the protesters in Zaidkhar Nala and assured them of taking up their concerns with the provincial government and resolving the matter in ten days. The protesters then agreed and removed the blockades, allowing traffic to finally move around the afternoon.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 22^nd, 2014.