Page 2 of 4 INTERVIEW Frontier wisdom
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
The tribesmen of FATA are fully fledged Pakistani citizens. They are entitled
to a passport, a national ID card, they can join the civil services, the armed
forces - they are there from soldier to general. And very importantly, they can
own, purchase and manage property anywhere in Pakistan.
However, due to historical reasons, a different politico-administrative system
evolved from the old British Empire policy, creating buffers between the
advancing Russian imperial army, then as Afghanistan as a buffer with the
Russian empire, then the tribal areas as a buffer between the Indian empire and
Afghanistan, and the frontier regions as a buffer between the tribal areas and
settled districts.
So that created a system of buffers. Each has a slightly different
administrative system. In this there was a political agent whose administrative
authority was limited to protected areas, that is, roads and government
buildings, and no more. In the rest of the [tribal] areas there are customary
laws - riwaj. The political agent is also bound by the riwaj when
he operates in those areas, that is why he is called a political agent, he is
not an administrative officer. He has to deal with the tribes politically.
Secondly, this is simplified, there is no thana [police station] no katchari
[lower courts] no police etc. You have tribal laws, the riwaj, the jirga
system [tribal councils]. There are major concessions from taxation, but all
this is not free, sir.
In return for all these concessions, and these are collective concessions from
which the tribes collectively benefit, there is a collective responsibility, a
trade-off that every tribe is responsible for the security of its own
respective areas, which is called Apni Mitti ki Zamdari [responsibility
for one's own land].
This entails that roads in those areas should be open, the political
administration in that area should carry on its traditional responsibilities
without any hindrance. And the traditional law-enforcing agencies, like the
Frontier Corps, Khasadars, carry on their traditional activities unhindered. It
is most important that a tribe will not allow the use of its territory as a
sanctuary for any criminal and anti-state elements to act against the interests
of Pakistan ... which are diluted now.
So, we talked to the tribes and said, "Look, you have this concession and this
is your collective responsibility. Now, if you want to enjoy these concessions,
come up with your collective responsibility that you cannot allow your
territory to be used as sanctuary for anti-state elements for criminals as is
happening now."
We tell them that we understand they have problems and that they are weak, but
the state of Pakistan is there to help them. This was the basis of our
agreements with them.
Now, if there is a violation of the agreement, then there are the FCR [Frontier
Crime Regulations], which are generally called draconian laws or black laws.
These provide a system of redress, and it is a graduated response system.
First, say there is a violation by a tribe or an individual in that tribe, the
first step is to call a jirga of the tribal elders and give them a
reasonable period of time [to rectify the problem].
If it does not happen, then you can put pressure, through penalties, stoppage
of allowances etc. If that pressure does not work, then you can start with a
system of risks, where you start with the near family of the individual and
slowly move towards the tribe. This is how it happens, to put more pressure,
you arrest them under the FCR. But because it is a collective responsibility,
the response is also collective and if it does not work then the FCR allows for
any economic blockade, you can block the roads, you can seal their shops, you
can freeze their accounts.
If nothing works, then military punitive action can be taken.
If you examine the FCR, it is an adaptation of tribal culture because if there
is a dispute between two tribes or two individuals, what would they do? First
they have a jirga to talk it out. If it does not work, they block the
roads, and if that does not work, they catch each other persons ... if that
does not work, they form a lashkar [militia] and they fight.
That is why when last year on the floor of parliament the prime minister
announced the intention to repeal the FCR there was an immediate major reaction
- two reactions. The first was that it was a black law, that it was draconian,
so get rid of it. Very good. That reaction came from non-tribal Pashtuns who
were either living in the [cosmopolitan centers of] Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar
or Islamabad, Dera Ismail Khan, but not in the tribal areas.
From inside the tribal areas there was a different reaction. They said, "Look,
this is our law and we understand it is according to our custom and traditions,
don't abolish it. If you want, maybe make small reforms, but if you are really
bent on removing it, then we don't want that." This is what they said to me:
"Governor sahib. Give us the sharia [Islamic laws]." If you remember, it was
all over the newspapers that there was the demand for sharia by the evening
[after the prime minister announced his intentions]. It was because the FCR are
very similar, it is basically an adaptation and modification of tribal culture,
that is why they have an acceptability there.
So our response to the problem was three-pronged. One was to deal with the
tribal people on the basis of their own traditions. Two was to reconstruct and
restrengthen the administrative system according to the FCR and the old tribal
system. We talked to these people [and said], "Look, you have to get your lives
in order, this is not on and you are suffering, we are also suffering. If your
people are going and crossing into Afghanistan, you are creating problems for
Pakistan, this has to stop. We understand you are weak and we will help you,
but you get your act in order." When they did not get their act in order we
tried jirgas and everything, and when they did not work, eventually it
came to military punitive action.
North Waziristan, yes there are problems. However, since February [2008],
because of this agreement, it has been quiet. But there are [still] problems,
we understand this, but we are working through the system now to slowly,
slowly, solve them. Otherwise, it is a conflict zone, the administration is out
and everybody is out. This is what I told our allies, that in a conflict zone
there is nothing you can do, it will continue to radicalize society. You have
to stop the fighting and let normal economic and social activities take place.
You have to let the administration go back in there so that you can create
space and restrict the space for militants, otherwise the entire space is a
conflict zone and is available to the militants, as it is available to our
forces also.
Now there is another thing which people don't understand. Each agency [tribal
area] has its own peculiar character and its own peculiar conditions, its
tribal balances and each has to work separately. I will give you an example. In
South Waziristan, we have the Ahmadzai wazirs [tribe] who are
traditionally a quarter [of the population] and we have the Mehsud [tribe] who
are three-quarters. But the Mehsud does not have borders with Afghanistan and
they have to travel to each other's territory for their normal activities, and
that decides the tribal balance and the tribal politics. However, after 1979
there was a migration of the Ahmadzai wazir from Afghanistan into this
area and in that old population the demographic balance was disturbed. So a new
set of conditions has come in.
In Kurram Agency there is a Shi'ite and Sunni thing and in addition there is a
third outside element - militants, which complicates the situation. So each
requires a different approach. We have done it successfully in Bajaur [Agency]
and successfully in Mohmand [Agency]. If militants surrender and stop fighting,
the civilians, for example in Mohmand Agency, the Tarakzai tribe, they said
they will take responsibility for this person [militant] for his good conduct.
We have done this in the major parts of Khyber Agency, we are doing it in Dara
and we have the same agreements now in North Waziristan, in South Waziristan,
in the Wazir area, and we have some sort of stability.
[However,] in the Mehsud area [in South Waziristan] we took action last year,
we talked, but when it did not happen [peace] and an attack came from the other
side, we started military actions. But we did it in the traditional way, that
whenever we used to bomb an area we would give notice for women, children, old
men and non-combatants to get out. There was an immediate exodus of 170,000 and
we were ill-prepared for that but we quickly vacated schools for them, erected
tents etc and put them up while we took action. As soon as the operation was
over, they went back.
The same happened in Bajaur Agency before we started action, we told the tribal
chiefs that action was going to happen and they should vacate the area and that
is why 300,000 people went out, 40,000-50,000 in camps. The rest stayed with
families and friends in different areas. Now [since the operation is over] they
are in the process of going back.
ATol: You mentioned the agreement in North Waziristan. It
resulted in peace undoubtedly, but immediately after the peace agreement the
militants formed a shura, a shura of mujahideen
OAG: The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan [TTP] ...?
ATol: No, I am talking about the shura of mujahideen.
OAG: No, sir. We had the TTP. The shura of mujahideen has
come now [not immediately after the agreement], just a month or two ago.
ATol: Anyway, they have turned their guns towards Afghanistan.
Peace came here in Pakistan, but at the cost of more insurgency in Afghanistan.
OAG: The world is responsible for Afghanistan, all the troubles
we face here are from Afghanistan, the roots of the problems are in
Afghanistan, not in Pakistan. We have been battling the fallout from
Afghanistan and I say it is not Pakistan's responsibility. Nobody should blame
Pakistan because, number one, we never invited the Soviet army into
Afghanistan. It was the Afghans themselves. We never brought international
terrorists into Afghanistan. It was not our ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence]
or anybody, it was international intelligence agencies, over and above the
objections of the ISI.
There was a basic agreement that only Pakistani intelligence would deal with
the [Afghan mujahideen groups in the 1980s] and jihadi organizations and
everybody in Europe and the US supported this. But they started their own
operations and they were warned that they would not be able to control these
people. And that is exactly what happened. But Pakistan was not responsible for
that.
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
