PESHAWAR, Oct 18: The Mohmand tribesmen on Wednesday decided to cultivate poppy over 2,500 acres between Machni and Parangh Ghar to protest against annexation of 25 villages with Charsadda district.

The decision was taken at a grand tribal jirga held here, leader of anti-annexation movement and attended by over 300 elders of Tarakzai, Halimzai, Barankhel, Essakhel and Otmankhel sub-clans of the Mohmand tribe.

They announced that they would block traffic on the Peshawar-Bajaur road passing through the agency area on Nov 5. They asked the government to accept their demands, otherwise they would resort to other options for the purpose. The jirga decided that if the 25 villages were returned to the agency, they would destroy the poppy crop and reopen the road.

They urged the government to treat them respectably and said that they had sacrificed for Pakistan and could do it again selflessly.

Prof Ayaz, whose jujra was used to hold the jirga, said the tribesmen of the annexed 25 villages, including Tarakzai, Halimzai, Barankhel, Essakhel, Otmankhel were living in the Mohmand agency for the past 800 years and in Pakistan for 54 years. The entire population would live a peaceful life under their own tribal code, but the then NWFP chief minister Mehtab Ahmad Khan had ordered the inclusion of 25 of their villages in April 1999. For the last seven years, he said, people of these villages had been pressing the government to revoke its decision. He said during the past seven years, tribesmen had been cooperating with the political administration instead of taking up their affairs with the district Charsadda government.

Prof Ayaz said that lawlessness had increased manifolds after the police took control of their villages. He said murders, car-snatching, kidnapping for ransom and robberies had become a routine matter and peoples’ lives and property were not secure.

In the past, he said khasadars and one tehsildar were running the affairs, but now 6,000 police constables and Frontier Constabulary personnel could not control the law and order situation.

He urged the district Charsadda administration to stop interfering in tribal affairs and said that tribesmen preferred to “to live under the political agent, tribal system (jirga) and Frontier Crimes Regulations” instead of allowing to be ruled by a district coordination officer.