Demonising Pukhtuns: PkMAP warns govt of backlash

Achakzai calls for end to typecasting of Pukhtuns as terrorists

ISLAMABAD: The Pukhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) organised a protest on Sunday against the latest crackdown by the government against the Pukhtun community living in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, as part of the follow up to the National Action Plan purportedly adopted as an anti-terrorism strategy.

Political leaders at the protest revealed the state’s “blatant policies of implicating a specific ethnic community holding Pakistan nationality and its accompanying authorised document validating its right to citizenship.” They insisted that despite constitutional guarantees of right to equality, the Pukhtuns are impugned for their Afghan lineage.

They further stated that in the last few weeks nearly 55 shops owned by Pukhtuns in AJK were forcibly shut down by the government under the pretext of defending the country against terrorism.

“Without serving prior notice, the government officials had ordered eviction and shut down orders to shops belonging to Pukhtun who have been residing in AJK well before the country achieved independence,” the party’s press release stated.

Addressing the protest, party chairman Mahmood Khan Achakzai warned the government of serious consequences if the alleged typecasting of Pukhtun as terrorists was not abolished. Achakzai revealed that CNICs of over 70,000 Pukhtun are being blocked on account of their Pukhtun lineage in Balochistan.

“If you don’t like the way the Pukhtun look and want them to leave Kashmir I suggest the government should compensate by buying their businesses and land,” he stated.

“The Pukhtun, have given their blood to create this country. Is this how the state rewards those whose ancestors were martyred during the Kashmir jihad of 1948,” he asked.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2015.