LANDI KOTAL, Jan 29: Fata parliamentarians are working for their own interests and neglecting the voters, Imran Afridi, chief of the Khyber Agency chapter of the Awami National Party, has said.

Addressing a gathering of tribal students in Bara, he said the parliamentarian were opposing the introduction of Political Parties Act into the tribal areas because of a lack of political background.

He said the tribal MNAs and Senators had totally failed in resolving the longstanding problems of their constituencies and thus were keeping area residents deprived of basic amenities of life.

Imran Afridi said the proposed fencing and mining of Pakistan-Afghan border was aimed at further dividing the Pakhtuns living on both sides of the border.

Meanwhile, Jamat-i-Islami Provincial Deputy Secretary General Zar Noor Afridi too opposed the mining of border and said that his party would resist the plan proposed by the Musharraf government.

In a statement he said the majority of tribal people were opposed to what he called the ‘in-human’ and ‘un-Islamic’ policy of the government. Zar Noor Afridi said that people around the world were opposed to such unnatural division while the Pakistani government was bent upon dividing Muslims. “This was neither in the interest of Pakistan nor that of Afghanistan,” he concluded.