PESHAWAR: Spealcers at a workshop about the future governance system in Federally Administered Tribal Areas were of the view that whether tribal areas were given a status of a separate province or merged into the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, opinion of the local people must be taken into account.

The Cell for Fata Studies, University of Peshawar, in collaboration with Peshawar Uplift Programme had organised a twoday workshop for Fata students where they developed understanding of the existing governance structures and what were the options for the future as an alternative to the existing setup in the tribal areas.TV anchor Salim Safi, who himself originally belongs to tribal areas, said that the status quo was not an option as the prevailing system deprived the Fata people of their basic human rights.

He said that no country in the world had any such piece of land or areas like Pakistan had tribal areas where there was a constitutional, legal and political void.

He said it was high time that Fata should be brought to the mainstream as people of tribal areas were no different from those in other parts of the country. He said that forming commissions and reform committees would not help as it was time that laws like Frontier Crimes Regulation should be done away with.

About the future status of tribal areas, Mr Safi said that since people of Fata were already using the resources and infrastructure so instead of separate status the tribal areas should be merged with the settled areas.

He said that people of tribal areas had been deprived of legal and human rights as well as budgetary funds, which was why theseareas and people were underdeveloped.

`The budget allocated to the entire Fata is much less than one mega project being undertaken in Islamabad,` said Mr Safi highlighting how tribal areas could get sufficient budget if given status like other provinces or merged into a province.

Talking about the existing administrative structure in Fata, Senior journalist Rahimullah Yousafzai said that the changes taking place in the region in terms of politics, security, economy and likely dif ferent governance models in future for tribal areas, gave details of how an estimated 4.6 million population in Fata was underdeveloped due to lack of political will and military role in the postsecurity scenario.

He said the reforms were negligible compared to the strict laws and insecurity, which had actually disempowered the common man in Fata.

He said that there was no mega project in Fata and about Rs19 billion were allocated for ADP 201415 while most of the financial pow-ers lied with the federal government, and Fata secretariat could only allocate Rs200 million for projects.

Fata is still underdeveloped despite having minerals and metals like copper, coal, marble. Only 7 per cent of its land is cultivated and most of the people go abroad to End jobs or do business in cities like Karachi and Rawalpindi.

Mr Yousafzai said that people of tribal areas should be taken into confidence whether a separate province was needed or these areas be merged into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He also talked about how Afghanistan would want to be taken into confidence when any decision was taken about the governance structure oftribalareas.

However, he said that clearing the tribal areas from militants, establishing peace, rehabilitation of IDPs were the major issues which would be resolved soon.

Both the journalists gave answers to the students about the system of governance, peace, and the role of army and politicians in the future of Fata.