Over the past year, the security situation in Pakistan’s northwestern Pakhtun tribal regions has significantly deteriorated. Many observers attribute this worsening situation to the return of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the country’s largest terrorist-militant network, from Afghanistan to the adjacent tribal areas of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province.

The immediate cause of the deteriorating law and order in these tribal regions—formerly known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) before their 2018 merger into KP, and now referred to as the Merged Tribal Districts (MTDs)—is the resurgence of the TTP. Following extensive Pakistani military operations between 2014 and 2016, the TTP’s leadership and fighters had fled or relocated to Afghanistan. However, the return to power of the Afghan Taliban in 2021 gave the TTP new life, providing it safe havens in Afghanistan and encouraging cross-border attacks into Pakistan.

Given the geographical proximity of the MTDs to the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, the TTP has been able to launch frequent attacks, taking advantage of sanctuaries across the border. The group’s operational focus on the MTDs is driven not only by logistical and strategic considerations but also by demographic ties: many of its members hail from these areas. Key TTP leaders—founder Baitullah Mehsud, his successor Hakimullah Mehsud, and current leader Noor Wali Mehsud—are all from South Waziristan, previously known as the South Waziristan Agency in the former FATA.

This raises an important question: why has the TTP taken root and flourished in the MTDs? While several factors may contribute, the most critical explanation lies in the region’s extremely underdeveloped physical, economic, political, and social conditions. Despite intense national debate in recent years over whether to hold “peace talks” with the TTP, there has been little public or media focus on the socio-economic and cultural context of the tribal areas that allowed such groups to emerge in the first place.

Media coverage has often focused disproportionately on TTP-related terrorism, with insufficient attention to the local socio-political dynamics and the real challenges faced by the people. Understanding these dynamics is essential to grasp how extremism and terrorism have taken hold in the region.

One key reason for the lack of nuanced media discussion is that most analysts and commentators on the region are non-locals who lack deep familiarity with its context. There is thus a pressing need to engage more directly with the lived realities of the people of the MTDs—to understand their grievances and how these are connected to the rise of extremism. Without this understanding, any attempt at governance or development in the region will remain ineffective.

For example, during the PML-N government (2013–2018), the then Minister for States and Frontier Regions (SAFRON), Lt. General (R) Qadir Baloch, informed the Senate Standing Committee on SAFRON that billions of dollars in international aid intended for development in the region were misappropriated by corrupt officials, NGOs, and tribal elites. This case underscores why repeated government claims of development and mainstreaming of the MTDs have largely been superficial.

One of the most pressing grievances of the inhabitants of the Merged Tribal Districts (MTDs) is the lack of economic opportunities and avenues for earning a decent livelihood. Residents argue that in a region where industries are virtually non-existent and agriculture is severely limited, the government and international donors should have taken substantial steps to create job opportunities, support land development, and offer alternative sources of income. In the view of many locals, the only viable path to alleviating widespread poverty in the tribal belt has always been through consistent government intervention and targeted international aid. According to various government estimates, the poverty rate in the former FATA exceeds 70%, with the majority of the population earning less than two US dollars a day (approximately 560 Pakistani rupees).

Another major concern among residents is the outdated and inadequate physical infrastructure, coupled with the absence of essential public services. The people of the MTDs continue to struggle with the lack of well-equipped hospitals, schools, universities, clean drinking water, functional roads, bridges, recreational facilities, and sports centers. Although various development projects were initiated before the 2018 merger under the FATA Annual Development Programmes (ADPs), and later continued under the Accelerated Development Plans (ADPs), insufficient funding and rising project costs have led to significant backlogs. Massive “throwforward” liabilities—a legacy of earlier FATA ADPs—persist today, and with the current level of financial commitment from the federal and KP governments, it may take years to complete ongoing projects. As a result, the development impact remains minimal and poorly visible. Despite a relative increase in allocations since 2002, the per capita government-funded development investment in FATA remained at a meager Rs. 905 for many years, and it still remains critically low.

The failure to implement functioning local government structures in the MTDs is yet another key grievance. Without operational local bodies, basic civic issues cannot be addressed effectively. Although elections have been held for National Assembly and KP provincial assembly seats in the MTDs, the representatives have had little power or resources to resolve the pressing concerns of their constituents, let alone drive meaningful development.

The grievances of ordinary tribesmen and tribeswomen are both longstanding and legitimate. For decades, successive Pakistani governments—either by design or neglect—kept the tribal areas on the Afghan border underdeveloped and marginalized. During British colonial rule, FATA was deliberately maintained as a buffer zone between British India and competing regional powers like Czarist Russia and later the Soviet Union (1917–1947). After independence, Pakistani authorities continued this policy, preserving the region’s status as a strategic buffer with Afghanistan, which has historically made territorial claims on Pakistan, including the FATA. In pursuing this narrow strategic approach, decision-makers failed to recognize the ground realities and the long-term risks of neglecting development in the area. As the population of the MTDs has grown and society evolved, this policy has begun to backfire. Disillusionment with the state and growing sympathy for militant groups like the Taliban are, in large part, consequences of the state’s failure to deliver even basic services.

Militant groups operating in the MTDs have been adept at exploiting these grievances. They have tapped into local frustrations over poor governance, a dysfunctional justice system, and the dominance of entrenched tribal elites. The post-merger situation has only added layers of complexity. By promising a justice system characterized by swift trials and equality before the law—sometimes even establishing Islamic Qazi courts and resolving disputes quickly to public satisfaction—groups like the Taliban were able to win popular support between 2007 and 2013. While the grievances of the general population are distinct from those of the militants, the latter have skillfully manipulated public dissatisfaction with the state to carve out space and legitimacy for themselves in the region.