The Betrayal of the Pashtun of FATA – Part II

PLM vs PTM

Why have those who put so much stock into the PLM find their concerns and core issues abandoned, or betrayed, by the PTM?

PLM

PLM was focused on key concerns of the people of FATA and KP. Their demands centred around the grave injustices faced by mainly Pashtun populations as a result of the war on terror, repeated drone strikes and the military operations against militants, foreign and domestic, in KP and FATA. Drone strikes from Afghanistan conducted by the US and hailed with near euphoric hysteria by the Afghanistan, India and US governments, as well as their supporters within Pakistan, have been a major source of civilian deaths in FATA along with the actions of domestic militants operating under the shadow and support of Pakistan’s geo-politically motivated Army. Most of these policies, vociferously supported by most outspoken civil society and human rights activists as well as warmongering media outlets in the rest of Pakistan, had led to innumerable deaths, termed collateral damage, and enforced disappearances of locals during and after military operations. The sheer number of alleged enforced disappearances, sometimes designated by the relatively benign term ‘missing persons’, is enough to rattle any conscience. Those from FATA and KP who showed reluctance to join the war mongering, opposed drone strikes from Afghanistan or conduct large scale military operations by the Army were ridiculed as terrorist sympathisers and given comical accolades by the mainstream and Pashtun Nationalists including the ANP. The PLM marchers voiced their anger at the profiling of Pashtuns in urban centres such as Lahore and Karachi. To the extent that PMLn government in Punjab and the PPPP & MQM coalition had expressly refused the sanctuary and temporary relocation of IDPs from FATA and KP in the provinces of Punjab and Sindh. This profiling of Pashtuns as terrorists provided the instigating act of the protest through the extrajudicial murder of Pashtun in Karachi by a police officer widely perceived to operate under the patronage of the PPP government in Sindh. They also expressed profound anger at the failure of the PMLn Government, with a two-third majority in parliament, ostensibly at the behest of its political allies PkMAP and JUI-F, to reverse the colonial rule in FATA by mainstreaming the region, a process begun in earnest twelve (12) years ago through the All Parties’ Committee on FATA and was repeatedly, unforgivably, delayed by the PMLn government since 2013. Military check posts, the treatment of locals at these check posts and the colonial attitude of federal administrators were among the most vocal criticisms repeatedly voiced by the PLM marchers. They called for FATA to have local governments, local courts and formalised local security and police forces, in short, they wanted FATA to be provided the same rights that the rest of Pakistan enjoyed.

Saeed Afridi currently works at the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Westminster. Saeed does research in Foundations of Political Theory, International Security, Energy Security and Complexity Theory in International Relations.

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