Bajaur Minority Calls for Democratic Representation
Fazal Rahman
Bajaur: Instead of selection based on quota systems, our representatives should be elected through elections, said Bajaur Minority Community President Pervaiz Masih, adding that the benefit of being elected through elections would be that these individuals would be committed to resolving our issues.
When people are elected from various political parties, instead of addressing our issues, they focus on their own and their party’s interests and tell us which vote we’ve given, which, to some extent, is accurate, further said Masih.
“In our opinion, only those elected through votes will solve the issues of the minority community.”
45-year-old Yusuf also seemed quite worried about his problems, saying that, among other problems, there is no residential colony in which we can live happily. He further said that when he came to Bajaur, a one-room house was available for him in the Civil Colony compound, but now his children cannot stay in this house and the district administration is outside the compound due to security reasons.
Yusuf further said that the district administration has also been told in open court that they should consider building a colony to house the minority community, but our problems have not been resolved yet.
48-year-old Parvez Masih said that we were young when we came to Bajaur. According to Parvez, more than 150 Christians are living in the area which consists of more than forty families, but they still bury their loved ones due to the lack of a cemetery in Bajaur. They go to Nowshera which is 150 km away.
President added that the elected members of Bajaur were also repeatedly told about their problems but nothing was achieved. If we had our own elected representative, we would have solved our problems.
When Parvez was asked about the vote, he said that now that the election is near, so many people have started contacting us on the phone, and every time the election is near, these political people make many promises to us during the election campaign. After winning the election, they didn’t even ask about our condition.
The community chief added that the five percent quota is not being implemented for the minority community in all the departments which is the basic right of young people.
Rubina Yusuf has been living with her husband for the past 17 years in Bajaur district; this time she does not want to cast her vote in the election.
Rubina further stated that there are more children and smaller houses because it has become difficult for women to stay in their houses. She further said that men are still out of the house all day. If people come to the election instead, they can solve their problems.
With the 25th constitutional amendment in May 2018, the former 7 tribal agencies and 6 frontier regions (FRs) were declared as part of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. For the first time, the country’s constitution and all government institutions were extended to the areas in which provincial and local government elections were to be held.
According to the Election Commission (EC), 16 general seats, 4 seats for women, and one seat for the minority community were allotted in the merged districts, which increased the total number of provincial assembly seats in the province to 145. In the above figures, 26 seats have been allocated for women and four for minority communities.
Pervez Masih demanded from the government that seats in the National Assembly be given to the minority community of the tribal districts so that the minorities of these districts get representation in the National Assembly along with the province.
According to Pervez, there are around 80 registered votes from the minority community in Bajaur. The number of voters belonging to religious minorities in the country has increased from 6.3 million to 4.4 million in 2018.
The number of registered voters belonging to religious minorities in the country has increased from 3.3 million in 2018 to 4.4 million. In the 2013 general elections, the number of voters from religious minorities was 3.7 million. Hindu voters in the country are 2.073 million, Christians are 1.703 million, and the votes of other minorities are 1.741 million.
In the 2018 general elections, the registered votes of minorities were 3.631 million.
In KP, 19,749 voters are registered in Peshawar district, 4,723 in Nowshera, 30,036 in Kohat, 2,314 in Khyber, and 1,951 voters are registered in Abbottabad. There are 5 districts in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa where the number of registered voters is less than 100. Among them, 8 in Kolai Palas, 12 in Kohistan Lower, 19 in Chitral Upper, 25 in Kohistan Upper, and 89 in Kirk have been registered for voting.
According to Article 51 of the Constitution of Pakistan, out of 336 seats in the National Assembly, 10 seats are reserved for minorities, and under Article 106, 24 seats are reserved for the provinces, in which 4 seats are reserved for KP province, 8 seats for Punjab, 9 seats for Sindh, and 3 seats for Balochistan.
According to the June 2022 voter list of the EC, the total number of registered votes of religious minorities in Pakistan is 3,956,336, in which the registered votes of men are 2,152,143, while the registered votes of women are 1,841,193.
Sana Masih was elected as a councillor in the municipal elections of the minority community in 2021. At that time, she thought that she would be able to solve her community’s problems to a great extent but due to the lack of funds, she could not do anything.
Sana pointed out that minority women face numerous challenges. She advocated for the allocation of dedicated seats specifically for minority women, alongside those reserved for minority men. Alternatively, she suggested the implementation of a distinct quota system catering specifically to the representation of minority women within the designated minority seats.
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