ISLAMABAD, July 20 (Xinhua) -- The Pakistani government has taken a major step to mainstream and transform the country's northwest tribal districts by holding the first-ever provincial elections in the region, once the safe haven of local and foreign militants.
Voting for the elections in the tribal districts, formerly known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), started on Saturday morning for the first time since the areas had been merged with the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) said.
According to the ECP, the polling is being held for 16 provincial assembly seats in seven tribal districts, the launching pads of several militant groups who forced tens of thousand locals to migrate from their hometowns.
Pakistani security forces established peace in the region bordering Afghanistan by conducting different operations from 2008 to 2017.
Following the elimination of terrorism, the Pakistani government started a process of rehabilitation and transformation of the region by inducing it into the national picture. In May Last year, the country's parliament passed a bill to merge the seven tribal districts into the KP, which made them eligible to take the facilities like other areas of the country.
Following the merger, the KP government has allocated a special budget for the tribal districts for the fiscal year 2019-2020 and also established police stations and courts.
Local watchers said that by giving the people of the tribal districts the right to elect their representatives in the provincial assembly will complete the process of political empowerment and it would bring a wave of development in the backward districts.
Previously, elections in the tribal area were held only for the National Assembly of the country's parliament. It also has representation in the Senate, but now the tribal districts will have their members in the provincial assembly as well.
Spokesperson for the ECP Altaf Ahmad told Xinhua that 2.8 million registered voters are taking part in the polls under tight security. The spokesperson said that army troops, police and personnel of other law enforcement institutions have been deployed at the polling stations across the tribal districts.
The official said a total of 1,895 polling stations, including 366 exclusive for women, have been established for voting. A total of 284 candidates are in the run and, out of them, 83 candidates are contesting elections from the platform of different political parties while 201 are independent candidates.
Polling started at 8 a.m. local time and it will continue till 5 p.m. local time without any break and unofficial results would be announced locally after the counting is completed while the final result will be announced by the ECP, the spokesperson added.
"10 percent participation of women in the elections is compulsory," said the official, adding that results will be canceled on any seat where the number of women voting is less than 10 percent of the total votes.
