Speakers at a forum of tribal elders and lawyers held by the Pak-US Alumni Network Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and TRDO in Lincolns Corner, University of Peshawar on Tuesday declared amendments in the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) as academic instead of practical which would lead to making the law more deadly for the people of FATA.
They said that jurisdiction of high courts and the Supreme Court must be extended to FATA and the area be governed according to the 1973 constitution rather than a regulation. The speakers said that as long as corruption prevails in the country no reforms could be implemented and FATA was no different, as the government’s writ was always under threat there. The people of North Waziristan took active part in liberation from the UK but after independence they were deprived of basic needs and fundamental human rights, North Waziristan tribal elder Malik Khan Mirjan said.
He said that 10 million people must be taken into consideration and FATA be made a separate province as Qabailistan for which a resolution was pending in the National Assembly (NA) since last year. Criticising the role of FATA MNAs, Mirjan said that they did not have an agenda for FATA and most of them took dictation from political agents before they speak about an issue concerning FATA in the NA.
