PESHAWAR: The Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa re-designated the positions of political agents with deputy commissioners (DCs) in the erstwhile Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA), according to a notification issued by the Home and Tribal Affairs Department.
Similarly, the posts of additional political agents and assistant political agents were also replaced by additional deputy commissioners and assistant commissioners respectively with immediate effect, the notification said.
The development comes weeks after a session of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly passed the KP-FATA merger bill with two-thirds majority, after it being already approved from the upper and lower chambers of the Parliament.
The session held on May 27 to vote for the bill was presided over by KP Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser, where Chief Minister KP Pervaiz Khattak was also present.
The vote count showed that 92 provincial lawmakers voted in favour of the bill and seven in opposition.
Thirty-First Amendment Act, 2018
The National Assembly and Senate had already passed the bill titled Thirty-First Amendment Act, 2018. In the lower house, the bill was moved by Minister for Law and Justice Chaudhry Mahmood Bashir Virk.
Two hundred and twenty-nine parliamentarians voted in favour of the constitutional amendment, while one voted against it. The bill was opposed by government-allied parties JUI-F and Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP).
In Senate, 71 lawmakers voted in favor of the bill while five opposed the constitutional amendment.
