It should not be surprising that the consistent lack of economic development and the resulting deprivation in these areas enables easy recruitment of militants. The US capitalised on this fact in the 1980s when vast amounts of funds were pumped into this region to create a staging ground for cross-border attacks into Soviet-occupied Afghanistan
The civilian exodus from South
Waziristan is escalating as the military operation there continues. While the adverse impact of the ensuing conflict on local residents seems hard to avoid, it is however vital to ease the displacement of the local residents as much as possible.
Officials are estimating that 100,000 people have already fled the area, while a similar number is probably going to leave as the operation continues. Yet, it is believed that the Waziristan refugee situation will not be as severe as the one witnessed earlier in Malakand division, where nearly two million people were displaced. A repeat of a similarly large challenge is considered unlikely in the case of South Waziristan since the population of this area is about half that of the Malakand region, where a military action had been initiated a few months earlier.
There is little room for complacency, however. The ongoing Waziristan operation is expected to be a tougher challenge for the army compared to what transpired in Malakand. While analysts are saying that the current operation will not last for more than two months, sticking to such a stringent time frame will remain difficult in effect. Given that winter is approaching, life may become even tougher for the displaced people if the conflict lingers.
One had hoped that the government would have learnt from the experience of the Malakand displacements and put in place a series of contingency plans to deal with the challenges that can unexpectedly emerge during the disorienting experience of conflict-impelled refugee crises. For instance, besides the need for ensuring that humanitarian assistance is extended to all the affected people, in this particular case, the authorities need to be wary of extremists trying to sneak out of the conflict area, posing as refugees.
Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) families from Wazrisitan are being registered and provided cash cards, the use of which was introduced during the Malakand displacements. But this registration process is still not problem-free. Moreover, despite the earlier experience of transport difficulties faced by the refugees fleeing Swat, and even Buner, the South Waziristan refugees are also confronted with a similar challenge of closed roads, and inadequate logistical support to enable them to move into safer areas.
As a result, a majority of displaced families are seen to be reaching Tank or Dera Ismail Khan through Mir Ali, North Waziristan, or else, through Zhob in Balochistan, without significant assistance. Many of these IDPs have even been compelled to undertake lengthy journeys on foot, with children and elderly family members, compounding the misery of their forced dislocation.
Multilateral agencies such as the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), several bilateral donors, relevant line departments and local and international non-government organisations are trying to provide assistance to these displaced people. It is hoped that this combined effort should enable the people of South Waziristan to survive their current ordeal.
Moreover, once the immediate needs of the current refugee crisis are over, it will be necessary for the government to finally take a more serious look at how to contend with the lingering development needs of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). FATA has seven agencies: Khyber, Kurram, Mohmand, Bajaur, Orakzai and North and South Waziristan. Until now, FATA remains a lawless ‘no man’s land’, which is still being administered directly by the federal government through a political agent, who wields much the same powers as his colonial-era equivalent. These political agents rely on the Frontier Crimes Regulations of 1901, which allows collective punishment of a tribe for an individual’s crimes, which is a completely incompatible notion in comparison to the modern legal system, and which in turn has subjected this entire region to an oppressively conservative tribal code.
FATA consists of approximately 3,000 rural villages with a population of three million people located on the country’s northwestern border with Afghanistan. It remains the most underdeveloped region in Pakistan. Nearly 60 percent of its population is living below the national poverty line. The overall literacy rate here is 17 percent, compared to the national literacy rate of 56 percent. Furthermore, no more than 3 percent among girls and women can read or write.
It should not be surprising that the consistent lack of economic development and the resulting deprivation in these areas enables easy recruitment of militants. The US capitalised on this fact in the 1980s when vast amounts of funds were pumped into this region to create a staging ground for cross-border attacks into Soviet-occupied Afghanistan, with the help of the Pakistani state. After 9/11 however, FATA provided sanctuary to the Taliban and Al Qaeda, who began using FATA against the Americans. This time around, the Pakistani state also became a target of the militants in FATA.
For a brief moment after 9/11, the Pakistani government seemed to have a chance to bring FATA into the national fold. Many local tribesmen wanted the federal government to give them a choice of either joining the NWFP or creating a separate province from the FATA agencies. If relevant political steps had been taken at that stage, followed by allocation of adequate development funds, such a strategy may have prevented FATA from becoming such a sore spot. Instead, the Pakistani regime kept swinging between the use of military means and signing tenuous peace agreements, which could not be honoured, and thus confused the local population and further eroded what little credibility it had in these areas.
The US also seemed keener to pursue military rather than economic or socially constructive alternatives in the region. It was not until 2006 that the US government committed to support development in FATA. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) thus designed an ambitious programme to support the short, medium and long-term objectives of the FATA Sustainable Development Plan, which is meant to be implemented by 2015. Many new activities to build the capacity of FATA institutions to deliver services to citizens, improve livelihoods, strengthen health and education services and develop infrastructure were thus proposed.
At the moment, however, there is an obvious dilemma: while lasting peace depends on development work, such development cannot commence in earnest until peace is restored in the region. It is however disconcerting that the funds being allocated for FATA’s development are being utilised rather rapidly despite the ongoing conflict that has gripped the region. It is vital to scrutinise how these development funds are being consumed. Unless the allocated development funds are spent on the people of FATA, so as to bring about tangible improvements in their lives, this region will remain a breeding ground for extremism, which always finds fecund ground in circumstances of deprivation, desperation, and disparities.
The writer is a researcher. He can be contacted at ali@policy.hu
Comments
Post a Comment