Dissecting Manzoor Pashteen's Demands - Myth and Reality

[Arsalan]

Dissecting Manzoor Pashteen's Demands - Myth and Reality
April 24, 2018

I have been following Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), its speeches, rallies and demands for some days now. Anyone with slightest interest in what is happening in our country could not have missed it. Gradually, we are having two sets of opinion about the whole movement, one that claims ALL of them to be RAW and NDS agents! Other that state that ALL they say is right and justified and that they are victims, people who need our support and applause for being champions of freedom of speech and for standing up to atrocities they have faced.

I have discussed the whole issue with quite a few people, studied it in detail and though about it with as neutral a mind as I could manage! Will like to take a few minutes here and try and analyze the demands being made by PTM and the whole movement in general.

Firstly, the demand is to stop the disappearances of their family members. Now how can someone call this an unjustified demand? No one will! However, there is actually more to it than this. There is no firm data or proof about how many people have gone missing and from speeches in the PTM rallies, things are being unfortunately exaggerated. I personally know two examples of such “disappearances”, one is of a group of 3 Afghani men who were taken from a factory in Faisalabad. 3-4 days later, some men arrived in civil clothes with police (and NO they are not ISI for God’s Sake!!) and informed at the mill that these men had ties with TTP and were involved in finance distribution. That their families have been informed as well and the factory is being informed now just in case they want to fight a case for them. What I want to share is that within 3 4 days of their disappearance, the agency came to the factory and shared the reason. It was not like they have just disappeared with no explanation. Second is of another guy I know personally, who was taken and then released a week later. He confirms that he was treated well and that it was all a confusion. Now am I trying to justify such disappearances? NO!! I am NOT!! For the record, Are these disappearances ok and do I have no issues with it? NO!! I do have my problems. Are such drastic measures necessary?? Sadly, it seems so! Desperate times, drastic measures. The agencies all over the world keep tabs on people they are suspicious of, people are taken for interrogations and all that. Though that do not makes it right, but just stating that it is not something unique and limited to Pakhtoon people or Pakistani security agencies only. It is wrong, a major violation of basic human rights but the war we fight right now, I am not sure if this is the worst thing to be happening! If I am to influence an opinion here, I would say that rather than crying about the consequences we should try and root out the issue that is causing the problem in the first place. Unregistered Afghan refugees, porous Pak-Afghan border, dead slow judicial systems with cases pending for decades, lack of political will power and the tendency to put own political interests over that of national interests. These are some sad realities that should be kept in mind while studying the case of such disappearances. What we should be focused on is to stop proliferation of terrorists from across the borders, make our judiciary swift so that rather than anonymous disappearances we get court trial and justice!

To conclude, in my opinion, the demand to end the disappearances is justified and should be heard and met. Action through more transparent means should be made swift so as this dissent is addressed. Also what we hear about it through PTM platform is a bit exaggerated (when it comes to number of such cases) and over simplified (when it comes to saying that is should just stop). Actions need to be taken to make it happen. Not taking them is criminal on part of government and makes this demand of PTM pretty justified.

Second, removal of FCR or Frontier Crimes Regulations. Sadly, it is something that many of us might not be even aware of. The FCR is a special set of laws of Pakistan which are applicable to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of northwestern Pakistan. The law states that three basic rights are not applicable to the residents of FATA – appeal, wakeel and daleel (the right to request a change to a conviction in any court, the right to legal representation and the right to present reasoned evidence, respectively. Outrageous right? It is. This makes no sense and have its roots in the Murderous Outrages Regulation of British Empire from pre partition era. To be honest, PTM is not the first one to raise voice against this. Majority of us non-Pakhtoon groups who know about this, from individuals to social groups and political parties have called to put an end to these senseless set of rules. In August 2011, President Asif Ali Zardari enacted a presidential order to amend the FCR. The reforms included new time limits on the amount of time local administration officials can wait before informing that they have taken someone prisoner. In addition, the 2011 amendments placed new restrictions on the collective responsibility clause in the regulation. Among others, changes included:[

• Protection of women, children below 16 and all people above 65 from collective responsibility arrest
• Prohibition against arresting an entire tribe under collective responsibility
• Time limits for disposing of cases
• Provision for a more independent appeals process
• Appellate authority power to review decisions
• Strengthening of the FATA Tribunal
• Power to transfer cases from political agent to assistant political agent
• Concept of bail
• Jail inspections
• Voluntary reference to a council of elders and Qaumi Jirga (people's assembly)
• Inclusion of local customs and traditions (Rewaj)
• Fines on communities in case of murder
• Forfeiture of public salary for involvement in crime
• Arrest by authorities other than political agent
• Checks on arbitrary power to arrest
• Punishment and compensation for false prosecutions
• No deprivation of property rights without compensation
• Audit of political agent funds

After taking a unanimous vote of confidence on 29 March 2008, then Prime Minister of Pakistan, Yousaf Raza Gilani, expressed his government's desire to repeal the FCR. Sadly, no progress has been made on overturning the regulation and that truly is a demand PTM is justified to make. Frankly, any sane Pakistani, Pakhtoon or not, supports them in this demand. FATA tribes have always demanded to rule and run their affairs as per their own laws but this seems to have changed. Immediate steps should be taken to either merge FATA with KPK or to make an independent province out of it. Getting rid of illegal Afghan refugees will again make this process much more manageable at administrative level.

So this is where we are now, stop unexplained disappearances and merger FATA with KPK and subject them to laws same as every other Pakistani. Justified and sensible. So what is the problem really? Unfortunately, this is where things start to deviate.

Third demand is to end fake encounters of Pakhtoon community or in other words, end ethnic cleansing of Pakhtoon in other provinces, the case they (PTM) quote, Naqeeb Ulaah Mehsud murder! This is misguiding and disgraceful! The murder of Naqeeb Ullah was NOT a murder of a PAKHTOON but a sad crime of murder of a regular guy at hand of someone who is not new to such indignities. Portraying this as ethnic cleansing of Pakhtoons is only meant to provoke a large ethnic group against rest of the nation. SSP Rao Anwar is notorious for extra judicial killings while in uniform. To mention a few, he is the same guy who was accused to be behind the killing of Farooq Patni in Karachi during the 90s when there was an operation going on against MQM associated criminals and terrorists being funded by RAW. Another guy whose murder is associated with Rao is Faheem Farooqi aka Faheem Commando. The killing was unfortunate, the murderer should be brought to justice but it was just as unfortunate as any other killing. Not some targeting anti-Pakthoon campaign the way PTM frantically tried to portray this. As far as I have followed PTM, this is where they started to lose support of Pakistani Pakhtoon community who enjoy equal rights and equal opportunities in all provinces and parts of the country.

Fourth demand, absurd again, is to stop harassing Pakhtoons and racial abuse direct at them AND even more absurd, to remove the security check posts as they are being used to harass the Pakhtoons. Again, this is misguiding people, provoking them against the state and rest of Pakistani population, which, to be honest, is criminal and amounts to conspiring against the state. I have lived my life in a city that shared border with KPK. There were posts all around it and being a sensitive area (POF Wah, PMO, HIT, AWC, HMC etc all within a few kilometers) there was some of the tightest security around. I can guarantee that not once in my 26 years there I have seen Pakhtoons being specifically held up at any one of those posts or harassed because of their ethnicity. The population of my town compromised of large number of Pakhtoons and have never ever even heard of any such thing. I have MANY pakhtoon friends and have discussed this with numerous others over the last few days and not once have anyone said that they are particularly targeted. The check posts are not in FATA or KPK alone. I have to go through one when I need to go buy bread. There are many in Lahore and they too will randomly hold you up and inspect. It is the security situation of the country and not some hate crime against an ethnic group as PTM is desperately trying to prove. Demanding removal of check posts is actually THE DUMBEST thing they have come up with. Only yesterday a terrorist was held up and blew himself up at a post, a guy who otherwise would have ended up in a Bazar or a Mosque! The army they blame is the one getting its men killed at these same check posts that have been keeping the terrorists away from the people that are blaming the army for the check posts. Have you heard anything more twisted? To me, this demand looks like India asking us to remove our forces from border. If someone comes to me and ask me that I should send my watch man on leave on April 17, 2018, I am a fool not to think that he is planning a robbery. Sadly, the but posts are a requirement, they are everywhere and are here to stay until the situation improve. Again, the need is to address the cause and not the consequence, seal the border and send the trouble makers back to where they came from.

Fifth demand is to clear the area of land mines. That is already being done and it is sad that PTM tried to mislead the people by mentioning this. Army is busy clearing the land mines that were mostly laid by TTP scums. The mines that were laid by Army are in Afghan border area and knowing the porous terrain, we know we cannot guard it 24/7. Fence is an option that is being worked at now and the mines that were deep in our territory are being removed. However leaving the border to Afghan unguarded is NOT AN OPTION and if that is what they demand (by asking to remove posts and remove land mines from that area) you cannot blame anyone to have doubted their intentions. We need to seal border with Afghanistan due to its centuries old unstable nature and there should be no compromise on that. Also it would have been great if they had mentioned that it was TTP who were creating all the trouble in this area and it was the army who gave sweat and blood to fight them. Not to mention money that came from the tax payers of ALL of Pakistan that fueled the war.

The strange part of this whole movement and the demands that are made is that they FAIL to realize and mention the root cause of majority of these problems. There is no mention of what efforts have been made to fight terrorism in these areas, no talk about the hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugee that make the task of security agencies difficult, demands of sealing the border with Afghanistan where majority of the terrorists come from. One have to wonder what these obvious issues have been ignored by a movement that claims to be fighting for Pakhtoons. Or is it that they fight always was for Afghans? A simple and quickest step that should be taken is to send Afghan refugees back things start to smooth out immediately. Send them back and merger of FATA with KPK becomes a much easier and manageable task to accomplish. With Afghans gone, the amount of security and scrutiny required will come down considerably, making life easier for ALL OF US! We can and should just send them back, fence the border and move on. If now they see all that is wrong with army check posts where the army men are targeted regularly by terrorists but had no problems when these posts were manned by TTP, it does nothing but create doubts. How many of the main characters of PTM were active in campaign against TTP two three years back? When TTP were killing our people by the dozen, they were all just quite on it. These are the questions a normal Pakistani will ask of PTM and in order to get support from all of the country they need to address these discrepancies.

People will unite in support to end illegal disappearances and merger of FATA with KPK but if the demand is to remove the security ring around our country and cities, provoke one group against another based on ethnic distribution, spit venom against the state, provinces and army, people will keep doubting the intentions and keep comparing them to the enemies of Pakistan. Abusing and blaming one ethnic group is not something that will solve the problem, it will and already is only complicating the matters.

For defence.pk
Arsalan Aslam

https://twitter.com/x/status/988739755511861248

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

Well the solution is as follow

100% integration with Pakistani Judicial System for FATA
Military / Airforce base in FATA

Civilian Side:

• Civilian body must launch a Research into Rehabilitation of the displaced (Internal displaced people) And determine if there is an economic problem faced by those community. Fairly simple to compare with Unemployment data and date on farms before and after etc

• If 4 Million people were displaced , how were they resettled back? And compensated financially

Set up a Hotline in their community for Clarification of Kidnapped people

• Person has gone missing ? Gone to Afghanistan? Or someone has moved to Pakistan internally for Job search or indeed there is a some investigation. Or if some third party force is active in Pakistan. Is there a border record of person travelling ?

Issue of Security / Check post:

• 95% security should setup on border every country has that provision. However Temporary checkpoints should be setup for snap checks. This should be inline with improvements in security situation gradually

Issue of Land Mines:

• I think border needs to be 100% closed

Example of proper closure Syria-Turkey Wall

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

The point is taken but there is no need for movement to move into Karachi
issue needs to be looked into in FATA area and it's integration with KPK should resolve 80% of problem

once the merge is complete local police / courts will take over and correct problems

KPK local leadership would also play their part to raise awareness of community problems in Parliment as they way it should have happen from start

 

[Arsalan]

Well the solution is as follow

100% integration with Pakistani Judicial System for FATA
Military / Airforce base in FATA

Civilian Side:

• Civilian body must launch a Research into Rehabilitation of the displaced (Internal displaced people) And determine if there is an economic problem faced by those community. Fairly simple to compare with Unemployment data and date on farms before and after etc

• If 4 Million people were displaced , how were they resettled back? And compensated financially

Set up a Hotline in their community for Clarification of Kidnapped people

• Person has gone missing ? Gone to Afghanistan? Or someone has moved to Pakistan internally for Job search or indeed there is a some investigation. Or if some third party force is active in Pakistan. Is there a border record of person travelling ?

Issue of Security / Check post:

• 95% security should setup on border every country has that provision. However Temporary checkpoints should be setup for snap checks. This should be inline with improvements in security situation gradually

Issue of Land Mines:

• I think border needs to be 100% closed

Example of proper closure Syria-Turkey Wall

Agreed!

Sending back Afghans and sealing the border will surely address most of the issues here. Also i will again point out that there are some just demands by PTM. Either they are serious about it or are using them just to blend their more vicious statements is something i wont debate on. Still the just demands should be met and authorities SHOULD come out and mentioned how many of them are already being taken care of (like de-mining in the areas which have been fenced). Missing persons is also an issue worth probing into, how many people are missing, can it be verified that these are taken by agencies and is it certain that they have not left to join TTP or Taliban?

In short, there are things that need to be worked upon by the authorities but PTM needs to realize that trying to provoke an ethnic divide, chosing to remain silent over TTP and Taliban, Afghan and Indian funding of terrorism and just crying and bashing army is something that is exposing them pretty badly.

 

[Samlee]

Agreed!

Sending back Afghans and sealing the border will surely address most of the issues here. Also i will again point out that there are some just demands by PTM. Either they are serious about it or are using them just to blend their more vicious statements is something i wont debate on. Still the just demands should be met and authorities SHOULD come out and mentioned how many of them are already being taken care of (like de-mining in the areas which have been fenced). Missing persons is also an issue worth probing into, how many people are missing, can it be verified that these are taken by agencies and is it certain that they have not left to join TTP or Taliban?

In short, there are things that need to be worked upon by the authorities but PTM needs to realize that trying to provoke an ethnic divide, chosing to remain silent over TTP and Taliban, Afghan and Indian funding of terrorism and just crying and bashing army is something that is exposing them pretty badly.

There Are No Doubt Some Legitimate Greviances But PTM Is Very Much Malafide B'Coz A Number of Of It's Participants Are Not Pakistani Citizens At All But Are Afghans,

Abolishing FCR Is Job Of Parliament and The Fake Encounters Are 99% Done By Police Then What Is The Reason For Spouting Venom Against Army and ISI?????

 

[Wolf]

I think pashteen is drawing major support from Afghanistan refugees through some assurances. If the refugees are returned then major support to him will vanish. So, time to get rid of afghanis

 

[TheLahoriGuy]

Good post.

 

[Zhukov]

Finally Quality Writing on PDF After some time.

 

[Arsalan]

Alright, so it is time to follow up on the initial write-up, motivated and encouraged by some eye opening experiences over last few days.

Like many others, i have been stating that the PTM did managed to come up with some very legitimate demands that should have been addressed even before they were raised like this to be honest. The merger of FATA with KPK for instance is something that should have happened years ago. Depriving a significant part of your country with the very basic right to vote and have a direct say in country's politics and direction was wrong even if we ignore the fact that it was Pakhtoon political parties that were against the merger. PTM used this to abuse Punjab with hope to create an ethnic divide, failing miserably as there really was no reaction from Punjab who looked upon Manzoor as a silly child having no idea about what he was saying, KNOWING, that one of his sensible demand is actually something everyone but his own Pakhtoon parties support. The merger of FATA with KPK was not the only thing. There were some other justified points raised, things that gained attention and support from people all across Pakistan, for one, it was the call for justice for Naqeeb, the one point agenda that actually gave birth to PTM in the first place in case someone have forgotten. There were protests in Karachi, at LUMS Lahore, students of various institutions organized walks and demands for justice were put forward. Once again, we will ignore how the facts were twisted and how what was another sad crime of a habitual criminal with political connections and backing, Rao Anwar, was made to look like a targeting attack on Pakhtoon, as if it was part of some ethnic cleansing drive. The signs were always there, even when i was writing and arguing with many how some good can be brought out of PTM and how some of there aggressiveness are actually legit, but i, like many others chose to look the other way and hope for the best.

The eye opener came when PTM came started to oppose the merger of FATA with KPK, in hushed tone at first, and then later on openly claiming it to be oppression of the rights of Pakhtoons! That was a real shocker! The assembly passing a bill that was deemed to give equal rights and opportunities to the people of FATA, that was DEMANDED by the Pakhtoons of the area, labeled as the legitimate demand by people like me was now being portrayed as OPPRESSION OF RIGHTS? It was like, what is going on? We though this is EXACTLY what you were asking for in name of equal rights and now that it is finally being done you say it oppress you rights? Something is wrong for sure. Is this some gross misunderstanding? Were we wrong when we though that FATA people want the FCR to be revoked? How could we be wrong about that? It deprived the people the basic right to justice! Then what? have PTM folks misinterpreted when the media announced that parliament have passed the bill to merge FATA with KPK? That would be funny. But the chants grew vicious, more and more venom was spewed against state of Pakistan, its institutions, particularly its army. There was a clear message that merger of FATA with KPK was not well received at upper echelons of PTM, ones that we were not certain about but the ones that were about to be exposed pretty badly. The Pakhtoon Tahafuz Movement was against possibly the one single most important bill and amendment that would have benefited the Pakhtoons the most. May be not Afghans but Pakhtoons for sure. It was a set back for people like me who have tried to find some good in PTM, tried to argue that may be we should listen to these people, they are our brothers and they do have some right demands! WHAT RIGHT DEMANDS?

The anti-state and anti-army hate speech continues to-date. The same army that have done more for the development of FATA than any political leadership, let alone and Pakhtoon political leadership have ever done, or dare i say, WILL EVER DO! When some of the social media activists are engaged they fail to give any solid reason of any of the things they are doing now, specially now after FATA merger with KPK is approved, army is cutting down the number of check posts, the ones that are targeted by TTP (who are mostly Pakhtoon right?) every other day only because they sit between the terrorists and the school your kid might be going to, only because PTM wanted it. What else is there? Do they really think they can pressurize us into stopping the construction of fence at Pak-Afghan border? The fence that is meant to keep out the terrorists, illegal arms movement, smuggling, drugs and almost every other evil you can associate with cross border infiltration. We need to seal-off that porous border, period. The PTM ever since the bill of FATA's merger with KPK have been approved made no sense at all. It will take a visit to London to see the harsh truth.

It was last month that i had the chance to visit England, London in particular. During the visit, walking around the city and taking in the rich experience a true cosmopolitan city have to offer i passed in front of 10 Downing street on way to Trafalgar square from Westminster Abbey. You don't even need to be very active on social media or to be following the news every day for Pashteen hats to catch your eye in front of the 10 Downing street, all you need is to be a Pakistani. There were some 80-90 people, gathered in a small area across the road from the entryway to 10 downing street (closed now for security reasons). This particular spot have accommodated many protests and it wont be wrong if i say that there is one going on almost daily. Anyway, seeing some 80-90 Pakistanis protesting against the state of Pakistan in London was really painful and that is why i had no other choice but to join the group, talk to them and try to understand once again what is going on. That perhaps was the single most brilliant or may be the worst idea i had on that day. The group, the one calling themselves Pakistani Pakhtoons were not even Pakhtoons. No one except a group of 7 Afghans were Pakhtoon. Out of these 80-90 people, there were some 15 Europeans, 50-60 Indians, 10-15 Pakistani guys but not Pakhtoons. See the pictures for yourself;

During the interaction with some of the group members i talked to a lady, an Indian lady to be precise and told that i am from Amritsar only for her to confirm that she is from Mumbai . When i enthusiastically mentioned how proud i am that we Indians are the most prominent part of this group right here, she was equally excited to say "Yes, we cannot leave our friends to suffer at hand of Pakistan and will do all we can do help them". That is when i mentioned that well i am from same Pakistan and that i will love if she could point me to a few Pakhtoons as well in this gathering. Had to leave after that obviously.

The point is, those 15 minutes in London have actually answered all my questions. It is not that there arent any Pakistani Pakhtoon community abroad, or in London. I myself know three very good friends, one from Peshawar and two from Attock who live in London. Still a PTM gathering being funded and crowded by Indian tells us a lot about the roots of this movement and its intentions or agenda. If the opposition to FATA KPK merger or the demand of removing security check posts or to stop border fencing was not enough for you to realize and see the truth behind these masked PTM faces, the fact that they are enjoying zero support from Pakistani community while a massive presence of Indian groups in their gathering abroad should give you an idea. The chants and demands at that particular protest? Pak Army is behind terrorism against Pakhtoons, Pakistan, i nuclear state is danger to the regional peace, call for UK and its friends to INVADE Pakistan and secure the rights of minorities like Mohajirs, Balochs and Pakhtoons.



I have seen many videos of Europeans, allegedly Israelis, present at PTM meetings held abroad. See articles and stories about the funding and finance coming from India and Afghanistan but for me personally, nothing will ever beat these three pictures or those 15 minutes as i have no doubt about their authenticity, i was there, i talked to them and i saw for myself all that was happening. That one day have changed me from someone willing to listen and trying to understand PTM and its demands to someone who have totally understood that the letter "P" in PTM is neither for Pakhtoon nor for Pakistan(i).

https://twitter.com/x/status/1006513243463081984

 

[Arsalan]

@DESERT FIGHTER

 

[newb3e]

dont forget it all started with rao anwar killing mehsud and our law dint do anything about it! injustice leads exploitation