ISLAMABAD: Former president Asif Ali Zardari has deplored that the Fata reforms package announced amid much fanfare in August last year had fizzled out and become a mere political stunt. He warned that ignoring political reforms in the tribal areas would exhaust the patience of the people there and could prove detrimental to national cohesion.

The Pakistan Peoples Party co-chairperson was talking to a delegation of Fata parliamentarians who called on him at Zardari House in Islamabad on Friday.

The delegation included Fata lawmakers Shah Jee Gul Afridi and Sajid Turi, head of PPP’s Fata chapter Akhunzada Chattan, Senator Sardar Ali Khan, PPP’s provincial information secretary Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar and political secretary Rukhsana Bangash.

Mr Afridi deplored that the government had gone back on its word regarding the reforms package, and announced that they were planning on holding demonstrations to protest against it. He also said that they would call a multi-party conference to frame a strategy for the merger of tribal areas with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and discuss the implementation of reforms. The MNA invited Mr Zardari to join them in their efforts.

Mr Zardari said that the PPP had opened the door for reforms in Fata in 2011 by announcing changes to the FCR and opening up tribal areas to political activities and jalsas by all political parties. He added that the PPP would be happy to participate in any endeavour which the Fata MPs devised to push for reforms.

PPP spokesperson Senator Farhatullah Babar said the former president had asked PPP parliamentarians to reject the proposed Rewaj Act, which he said was against basic human rights and inconsistent with the goal of Fata’s merger with KP.

Mr Zardari said the two colonial structures that needed to be disbanded immediately were the FCR and powers of the president to legislate for Fata without the participation of its people. Fata would have to be merged with KP in order to mainstream it, he said, while recalling that the KP Assembly had earlier passed a unanimous resolution in this regard.

He said the elected lawmakers of Fata also favoured the merger, while all political parties with the exception of two had endorsed it.

The government and those opposing reforms and the merger were doing a great disservice to the nation, he said, adding that denying the people of tribal areas their rights was like playing with fire.

The former president called for a strong local government in Fata, and said that the reforms were announced in Aug 2016, but it took the cabinet more than eight months to approve it. Despite reservations about the package, everyone had hailed the move to reform Fata.

But the bills brought in the National Assembly the other day negated the reforms process, he argued. The jurisdiction of superior courts was not extended to Fata, as promised, while the Rewaj Act, instead of abolishing the FCR, had further strengthened the century-old law, he said.

The draft of the Rewaj Act was never made public despite demands from stakeholders, he said. As a matter of fact, the government has gone back on its promise to merge Fata with KP, he said, and it now talks of ‘mainstreaming’ Fata instead of merging it with KP.

Separately, a 25-member delegation of the Akakheil Itehad Pakistan (AIP), a social welfare organisation working in Peshawar, Karachi and Swat, led by its chairman Haji Noor Sher Akakhail, called on Mr Zardari in Islamabad.

Talking to the delegation, the former president appreciated the social and philanthropic work they were doing to assist in the rehabilitation of the people in Swat that was ravaged by militancy in the not-too-distant past.

Education, particularly education for girls, was essential in the fight against extremism, said the former president. Malala is an inspiring example in promoting the quest for education, he said.

Published in Dawn, May 20th, 2017