PESHAWAR -  Jamaat-e-Islami here on Friday announced to launch a long-march for the fulfilment of promises made by the government for the rights of the people of the Federally-Administrated Tribal Areas.

According to schedule, the JI activists will launch the long-march on December 10 and to stage a sit-in in front of the Prime Minister’s House against the delay in the implementation of Fata reforms package.

The long-march would begin from Bab-e-Khyber, Khyber Agency and would proceed to Islamabad to stage a sit-in in front of the PM House. Thousands of people from Fata and KP would attend the march, the JI KP chapter chief Mushtaq Ahmad Khan informed.

He was speaking at a news conference at Almarkaz-e-Islami, the provincial headquarters of the party.

This march would enter the democratic struggle of the tribal people into a decisive phase, he said.

Khan said that other political parties would also be invited to participate in the march. Not only this, he informed that tribal elders, students, Ulemas, and traders would also join the marchers.

The federal government was delaying the process of implementation of Fata reforms package for no reason. This step-motherly attitude completed the JI would call for a march on Islamabad as time had come to give all fundamental rights to dwellers of the ever-neglected areas of the country.

It is out of control to further tolerate delaying tactics on the part of the federal government, adding that about 10 million tribesmen had been kept deprived of their basic rights, while just a few individuals are living luxurious lives. He blamed that the federal government was responsible for all these injustices meted out to tribesmen since long.

Though, a committee constituted by the government with a purpose to bring Fata into the mainstream had proposed in its recommendations that tribal areas should be made part of the KP province.

This proposal had already been approved by the federal cabinet in March this year, but since then there is a complete silence on the part of federal government to go ahead on implementing the reforms package, he said.

Mushtaq Ahmad Khan said that it was actually an attempt to disgrace the committee and the cabinet members as they both had approved the recommendations months back.

It was an unfortunate that legislation is done within a day time just to make a disqualified person as party head, but there is no progress on Fata reforms at all, the JI local leader deplored. The forthcoming general elections are nearing day by day, but the federal government has yet to approve giving representation to Fata in the KP Assembly, he said.

This process should be expedited so that the tribal people also have provincial lawmakers in the province. Prior to the 2018 elections, it is a must to give representation to Fata in the KP Assembly. If the government doesn’t do so, it means that the federal government wants to keep tribal people deprived of their rights for more five years, Mushtaq explained.