PESHAWAR: Despite lapse of over a year since the merger of erstwhile Fata with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, essential public service offices including that of deputy commissioners, judiciary and police of three tribal districts have yet to be shifted to their respective tribal district headquarters.

Former Fata was merged with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in June 2018 through 25th Amendment. The provincial government gave deadline to the deputy commissioners of South Waziristan, Orakzai and Khyber on June 30 to move their offices and line departments from settled areas to their own districts within three months to end sense of deprivations among the people. The decision has yet to be implemented.

The office of the deputy commissioner of Khyber tribal district is functioning in Peshawar Cantonment instead of shifting it to Jamrud or any other accessible location. Judicial officers for Khyber are having their courts in the federal judicial complex in Hayatabad, Peshawar. The district police officer for Khyber has set up main office at the Police Lines Peshawar.

The deputy commissioner of South Waziristan is running affairs of the area while sitting at camp office in Tank, 12o kilometres away from Wana, which has been formally declared administrative headquarters of the tribal district.

DCs, DPOs and judicial officers of South Waziristan, Orakzai and Khyber still sit in other areas

Kalaya is the administrative headquarters of Orakzai tribal district but its deputy commissioner is sitting in Hangu district.

Sources said that courts of the judicial officers were hearing cases in Hangu.

Similarly offices of DPO, communication and works, education, health, public health engineering, agriculture and forests have been operating in Hangu district.

A resident of Kalaya said that the DPO rarely visited the area.

The home and tribal affairs department through a notification had asked the deputy commissioners of the three merged districts to move their offices and other departments to the tribal districts.

The department had directed DC Khyber to shift his office to Jamrud subdivision, DC Orakzai to Kalaya and DC South Waziristan to Wana.

Officials said that there was a sense of deprivation among the people, especially in Khyber, Orakzai and South Waziristan that the offices of the deputy commissioners were far away and they were facing difficulties to travel to down districts.

An official said that despite merger, all essential public service offices of the South Waziristan were still functioning in Tank and Dera Ismail Khan districts.

He said that offices of DC, district education officer, judicial officers, DPO, irrigation, executive engineers of C&W and public health engineering were operating in Tank.

He said that agriculture director of South Waziristan had set up office in Dera Ismail Khan. He said that agriculture office had been set up in a rented building. He said that locals went to Tank from Wana for ordinary cases.

“People can’t afford to travel from Wana or other far flung areas of South Waziristan to attend court proceedings regarding their cases in Tank,” he said.

The judicial complex was recently inaugurated in Tank. Members of Ahmadzai Wazir tribe recently held protest demonstration against delay in shifting of essential offices from Tank to Wana.

Adviser to Chief Minister on Merged Districts Ajmal Khan Wazir, when approached, said that several offices could not be shifted inside tribal districts owing to lack of infrastructure.

He said that tribes in South Waziristan and Orakzai had differences as some wanted establishment of offices in their areas while others demanded those should be based in their localities.

He said that the government was trying to develop consensus among the tribes to establish essential offices at neutral places that were accessible and acceptable to all tribes.

He said that Chief Minister Mahmood Khan would convene a meeting in next few days to solve issues related to shifting of main offices from the settled areas to tribal districts.

Published in Dawn, November 4th, 2019