Pakistan car rally has critics hitting top gear IN AN effort to persuade a sceptical public that it has got the better of the Taliban and that life in one of the country's seven troublesome tribal "agencies" is improving, Pakistan's army is inviting car enthusiasts to hold a motor rally on a 130-kilometre route in South Waziristan in the last week of March. The race will pass through the town of Kotkai, where militants once trained child suicide bombers until the army retook the area amid heavy fighting in the northern summer of 2009. "Peace has returned to this area and locals will feel confident once foreigners and people from other parts of the country come," said Major Farooq Virk, a military spokesman. It is very secure and no incident has happened in this area for the last year and a half. So far, just a handful of car enthusiasts have signed up. Just three months ago authorities did their best to dissuade the politician and former cricketer Imran Khan from travelling along exactly the same route with a few thousand of his supporters, arguing it was too dangerous. Critics say peace has been achieved at the expense of the people of the area, particularly members of the Mehsud tribe, who were forced to leave South Waziristan when operations to clear the Pakistani Taliban were launched in 2009. The army has tried to persuade some of the displaced people to return to their villages but they have been either very reluctant or bitterly disappointed by what authorities had provided for them when they did return. "Such gimmicks have been tried in the past with no impact," said Rustam Shah Mohmand, a retired political agent who served in the area. "Who is this entertainment for?" asked Safiullah Mahsud, director of the FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) Research Centre. It is certainly not for the people of South Waziristan. Is it for the mountains, for the trees? It is a waste of money. They are not going to fool anyone in Pakistan or abroad.