Why are foreign donors so enthusiastic about alternative dispute mechanisms when they deliver second class justice for women?
It has taken nine military operations since 2002 to clear Pakistan’s frontier and tribal areas from Taliban, and millions of people have been displaced from their homes, some more than once. Pakistanis have paid a high price for allowing religious extremism to grow on their soil. Between 2003-17 over 21,000 civilians, and even more militants, have been killed.
Women in these conflict-affected areas have coped with violence and
displacement for over a decade now. They have lived with restrictions on their access to public spaces, attacks on women’s health service providers, and the closure of girls’ schools – with little public outcry in a nation that was reluctant to condemn the Taliban agenda.
Bravely, women have formed new organisations to resist some of the worst effects of ‘Talibanisation’ – including the first all-female jirga, or council, in Swat valley to give women facing family disputes and violence legal advice.
Some, like Farida Afridi, who founded the SAVERA group for women’s empowerment, have been killed for their audacity in promoting girls’ education and employment in the tribal areas.
The jirga system is a commonplace dispute resolution mechanism in Pakistan’s rural areas. It has been reviled by activists for its role in enforcing honour killings, rape as retribution during tribal feuds, the exchange of girls to settle disputes, and the broader exclusion of women’s voices.
But it is a powerful system, and its role is enhanced by corrupt and inefficient, overloaded national courts. Taliban also killed some tribal elders who were members of jirgas in order to establish their own authority.
The all-female council in Swat is a structure set up by women to give other women legal advice – but it has no particular standing as a dispute resolution mechanism or as anything equal to tribal jirgas, which are male-dominated. Rather, it reflects women’s dissatisfaction with the system that excludes them.
There is general agreement including among mainstream political parties and the government that the tribal areas must be fully integrated with the adjoining province Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa as a first step to resolving governance problems that made the area vulnerable to militancy in the first place.
As part of this, the government intends to do away with the colonial-era Frontier Crimes Regulations Act, which was used to govern the border areas indirectly through councils of tribal elders and administer punishments on communities for infringements.
But they are struggling to figure out how to do this without upsetting too many political interests.
Instead of simply giving the people full citizenship and political rights, and bringing them into the same administration as the rest of the country, the government’s Riwaj Bill proposed legalising the jirga a means of traditional conflict resolution alongside extending the jurisdiction of the higher courts to the tribal areas.
This was controversial and was rejected by political party representatives from tribal areas and by women’s groups, arguing that they should enjoy the same constitutional protections as other Pakistani citizens
It has taken nine military operations since 2002 to clear Pakistan’s frontier and tribal areas from Taliban, and millions of people have been displaced from their homes, some more than once. Pakistanis have paid a high price for allowing religious extremism to grow on their soil. Between 2003-17 over 21,000 civilians, and even more militants, have been killed.Women in these conflict-affected areas have coped with violence and
displacement for over a decade now. They have lived with restrictions on their access to public spaces, attacks on women’s health service providers, and the closure of girls’ schools – with little public outcry in a nation that was reluctant to condemn the Taliban agenda.
Bravely, women have formed new organisations to resist some of the worst effects of ‘Talibanisation’ – including the first all-female jirga, or council, in Swat valley to give women facing family disputes and violence legal advice.
Some, like Farida Afridi, who founded the SAVERA group for women’s empowerment, have been killed for their audacity in promoting girls’ education and employment in the tribal areas.
The jirga system is a commonplace dispute resolution mechanism in Pakistan’s rural areas. It has been reviled by activists for its role in enforcing honour killings, rape as retribution during tribal feuds, the exchange of girls to settle disputes, and the broader exclusion of women’s voices.
But it is a powerful system, and its role is enhanced by corrupt and inefficient, overloaded national courts. Taliban also killed some tribal elders who were members of jirgas in order to establish their own authority.
The all-female council in Swat is a structure set up by women to give other women legal advice – but it has no particular standing as a dispute resolution mechanism or as anything equal to tribal jirgas, which are male-dominated. Rather, it reflects women’s dissatisfaction with the system that excludes them.
There is general agreement including among mainstream political parties and the government that the tribal areas must be fully integrated with the adjoining province Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa as a first step to resolving governance problems that made the area vulnerable to militancy in the first place.
As part of this, the government intends to do away with the colonial-era Frontier Crimes Regulations Act, which was used to govern the border areas indirectly through councils of tribal elders and administer punishments on communities for infringements.
But they are struggling to figure out how to do this without upsetting too many political interests.
Instead of simply giving the people full citizenship and political rights, and bringing them into the same administration as the rest of the country, the government’s Riwaj Bill proposed legalising the jirga a means of traditional conflict resolution alongside extending the jurisdiction of the higher courts to the tribal areas.
This was controversial and was rejected by political party representatives from tribal areas and by women’s groups, arguing that they should enjoy the same constitutional protections as other Pakistani citizens
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