SWABI: The Afghan nationals living in Gandaf and Gohati refugee camps on Monday demanded the establishment of a registration office for unregistered refugees here, saying such people have to cover long distances to visit such facility in Mardan to their misery.

They asked the Afghan Commissionerate, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, federal ministry of the States and Frontier Regions and International Organisation for Migration to join hands for the purpose.

The Gandaf camp has 18,500 refugees after the repatriation of around 4,000, while 30,000 live in the Gohati camp.

The district administration claims around 20,000 Afghans live in rural areas of Swabi district.

The residents of the two refugee camps told Dawn that unregistered refugees were troubled as they had to cover long distances to go to the Mardan registration office for the required documentation.

They said around 20,000 refugees didn’t have the requisite documents and therefore, they needed registration under an exercise initiated by Pakistani government and International Organisation for Migration.

The camp residents said Peshawar had three refugee registrations offices, Nowshera two and Mardan, Kohat, Dir, Haripur and Mansehra one each.

“The Mardan registration office is always swarmed by unregistered refugees, including those from Swabi, who struggled to get the needful done all through the day. Many of them return without work,” said Mammada Gul, president of the Gandaf camp refugees’ association.

Refugee leader Ahmad Shah said the last date for the registration of unregistered Afghans was Dec 31 and therefore, a registration office should be established in Swabi, too, to cater to a large number of refugees living in the district.

He said the relevant authorities would be responsible if any untoward incident happened over the non-registration of refugees.

PERMANENT JOBS DEMANDED: The All Teachers Association on Monday demanded regularisation of the services of all teachers, who were appointed to the government schools and colleges on contractual basis after passing the relevant National Testing Service tests.

Chairing a meeting here, All Teachers Association president Abdul Latif said there was unrest among the teachers, who were recruited after passing the National Testing Service tests, over non-regularisation of their services and therefore, the government should offer them permanent jobs.

He said the teachers were united and would continue their struggle to claim rights.

Mr Latif however said the teachers won’t accept their victimisation.

Published in Dawn, September 19th, 2017