SWABI, June 2: A jirga comprises tribal elders and political figures here has rejected the imposition of property tax and asked the people not to pay it.

Members of the jirga said on Monday the district government and local administration had been informed about the decision. They said the people were not in a position to pay the property tax.

Briefing journalists, Javed Inqilabi, a spokesman for the jirga, said the jirga had constituted a 15-member committee which would hold further negotiations with the government about property tax and if the government did not accept its demand the committee would announce its plan of action which would also include agitation against the government decision.

He said the jirga members had appealed to the government to peacefully resolve the issue and withdraw the property tax as soon as possible.

When asked why the people of the district opposed the property tax, he said majority of people had been living in mud houses and had no regular source of income like the residents of the urban districts.

When a person could not feed his family how could it be possible for him to pay the tax, he asked. Secondly, he said, most of the areas were situated within the limits of the municipal administration where no facilities were available to the residents. But the government imposed property tax on all localities.

The government, he said, should differentiate between commercial and non-commercial areas, and the tax should only be imposed on the former. He said the committee had planned to announce its agitation plan in the next couple of weeks if efforts to resolve the issue peacefully failed.