PESHAWAR, Feb 16: The NWFP government will deploy 60,000 law-enforcement personnel at polling stations across the province.

This was stated by the special secretary, home and tribal affairs department, Mohammad Khalid Khan Umerzai, while briefing newsmen about the security plan for the Feb 18 elections.

He said the NWFP had been divided into four categories, ‘most sensitive’, ‘very sensitive’, ‘sensitive’ and ‘normal’.Charsadda, Swat, Shangla, Tank and Malakand have been categorised as most sensitive districts and Bannu, Lakki, Dera Ismail Khan and Lower Dir as very sensitive districts. Sensitive districts include Peshawar, Mardan, Kohat, Hangu, Upper Dir, Buner, Manshera, Battagram and Kohistan. Nowshera, Swabi, Abbotabad, Haripur and Chitral have been categorised as normal districts.

For administrative control of the province on the Election Day, the Frontier province has been divided into seven regions, Peshawar, Kohat, Hazara, Malakand, Mardan, Bannu and Dera Ismail Khan, headed by DIGPs.

Mr Umerzai said the army would assist law-enforcement agencies if needed.

The provincial government, he said, had decided to restrict the movement of

Afghan refugees to their camps and police had been directed to keep a check on them. He said that at present there were 1.3 million Afghans in the NWFP.

He said there were 7,931 polling stations in the NWFP, 1,094 of which had been declared most sensitive, 3,219 sensitive and 3,618 normal.

He said three candidates for provincial assembly seats in Upper Dir, Swat and Battagram had been killed and, therefore, polling had been postponed there. Mr Umerzai requested foreign observers and those working for foreign news organisations to inform the home department about their movement on the polling day.

He said the movement of foreign observes in eight districts, Swat, Shangla, Lower Dir, Malakand, Hangu, Bannu, Tank and the Frontier Region of Kohat (Darra Adamkhel), had been banned.

He said district police officers had been directed to strictly implement ban on display of arms. However, he added, candidates were allowed to keep armed bodyguards for their security.

Meanwhile, Authorities in Federally Administered Tribal Area (Fata) have sought deployment of additional force to ensure peaceful polling in the troubled region, officials said.

Senior officials in Peshawar told Dawn that political administration of the volatile Bajaur, Mohmand, Khyber and Orakzai regions were relentlessly asking for provision of more forces on polls day.

“The available force in the tribal region is inadequate to provide security at polling stations keeping in view the volatile situation in the area,” said a senior official. The political administration in Mohmand region, for example, had hardly 150 paramilitary soldiers for the polling duty, he said, adding that Mohmand and Bajaur regions were very sensitive.

“We are concerned about Mohmand and Bajaur regions which have small number of law-enforcers and have asked the competent quarters to provide the additional force for these areas,” the official said.

Sources said that Frontier Corps (FC) had already been overstretched due to the ongoing military operation in the region and political authorities in the seven agencies and six Frontier Regions were dependent only on the ragtag Levies and Khasadar forces.They said that authorities in Kurram, South Waziristan, North Waziristan and Frontier Region Darra Adamkhel had adequate paramilitary troops besides having Levies and Khasadars to be deployed at polling stations.