LANDI KOTAL: The Peshawar Development Authority (PDA) was forced to stop construction work at the controversial site at Regi Lalma Township on Saturday after a protest demonstration by hundreds of Kukikhel tribesmen.

Holding batons in their hands and vociferously chanting slogans against the PDA, the protesting Kukikhels started their protest march from Malak Shaga and lay siege to an under-construction site at the controversial Regi Lalma Township.

The protesting tribesmen argued that the construction was a violation of the Peshawar High Court order as the court had imposed a ban on construction on controversial site after it was approached by the aggrieved tribesmen in 2014.

A contingent of Peshawar police and khasadars was immediately called to avert any untoward incident as the protesting tribesmen were demanding demolition of the buildings under construction at the site to which the Kukikhel tribesmen lay ownership claim.

Officials of the political administration and MNA Haji Shahji Gul approached the protesters and succeeded in pacifying them after giving them assurance that the matter of construction on controversial site would be taken up with the PDA director general.

The Kukikhel tribe of Jamrud has long been accusing the PDA of unlawfully occupying some 20,000 kanals of land on which the tribe has proprietary claim. Kukikhel elders argue that the land lay beyond the boundary line between the Peshawar district and Jamrud tehsil of Khyber Agency which was drawn by the British commissioner of Peshawar in 1912.

Published in Dawn, January 1st, 2017