ISLAMABAD: They had left their homes to secure their life but are still unsafe. The lone camp set up by the government for internally displaced persons (IDPs) is infested with deadly black scorpions, an official said on Thursday.

Tariq Hayat, senior official of the Ministry of States and Frontier Regions (Safron), conceded before the Senate’s standing committee on cabinet division that the camp had been set up at a wrong place.

Apathy towards the IDPs

He told the committee that only 40-50 families were living in the camps as most had gone to live with relatives or in rented houses or school buildings.

But members of the committee said there were only about 50 people in the camp and the Safron official did not challenge them.

Kamil Ali Agha, a member of the committee, told Dawn that they expressed reservations over reports based on assumptions. No specific data was available about the IDPs living in school buildings and those staying with their relatives and in rented houses, he added.

He said only a few dozen of around one million IDPs were living in a single camp and it was a proof that the federal and provincial departments concerned had failed to make proper arrangements for them. Other members of the committee endorsed his view.

The Safron official said that the Afghan government had issued permits of weapons to 17,000 Pakistanis and allowed them to openly move to Khost.

He rejected Kabul’s propaganda that 100,000 people had moved to Afghanistan after the military operation was launched. “How can a government which has failed to bring back its 3.2 million refugee citizens can accommodate 100,000 migrants from Pakistan,” he said.

Senator Baz Mohammad Khan said the situation was tense in Bannu where clashes between IDPs and locals had become a routine.

Tribal people were facing difficulties on account of a conflict between the federal and provincial governments, he said.

Published in Dawn, July 25th, 2014