KHYBER: Police in Khyber have threatened to boycott polio campaign security and abandon wearing police uniform if the provincial government failed to announce a comprehensive service structure for them. The protesting policemen also established a protest camp at the historic Bab-e-Khyber in Jamrud where police personnel participate in groups from other merged districts.
The protesting police personnel said that despite their conversion from tribal Khasadar and levies force to the regular police soon after the merger of erstwhile Fata into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2018, the provincial government had so far failed to devise a service structure.
They said that a sense of deprivation and alienation was prevailing among the tribal police as they were performing their official responsibilities in extreme trying conditions.
They said that the then inspector general of police had in the presence of high ranking security officials promised them to implement their 22-points charter of demand which included devising an acceptable service structure, promotions, pensions and all the perks and privileges given to the police in the rest of the province.
They said that they would be left with no other option but to refuse providing security to polio vaccination teams, wearing the formal police uniform and even locking the offices of DPOs in all the seven merged districts.
The protest is spearheaded by senior policemen who are at the verge of retirement at the end of 2026.
Published in Dawn, August 21st, 2026
