“As long as drone strikes are not stopped in Waziristan there will be a ban on administering polio jabs,” according to pamphlets- titled Mas’ul-o-Khadimul Mujahedeen -distributed in Miramshah, the administrative centre of North Waziristan after a meeting of the Shura Mujahedeen (Higher Council of freedom fighters) of Gulbahar group of Taliban.

The reasoning given against vaccination is ingenious to say the least. “Polio infects one child in a million, but hundreds of Waziri women, children and elders have been killed in drone strikes.” it accused Islamabad of being hand in glove with Washington, citing the case of Shakil Afridi, the doctor who might have helped the CIA find Osama bin Laden through a vaccination drive in Abbottabad in 2011..

Pakistan is one of the few countries that still harbours the polio virus, including a strain found nowhere else in Asia, but some clerics have condemned the vaccine, putting thousands of people off vaccinating their children

Not only militants the tribal elders are also against polio vaccination though for a different reason. A grand jigra of Asad Khel, Dhur Dhanee, Muskee and Dosalee tribes held in June last vowed to continue boycotting polio vaccination drives until the government electrifies the region.

The elders’ case is simple and clear. They want electricity first and foremost. “We have been without electricity for the last 30 years and the government is ignoring the problem despite repeated requests and protests. We have no option but to boycott vaccination drives,” an elder of Dhur Dhanee tribe, Malik Mashal Khan, told The Express Tribune.

Tribal leaders also accused the local political administration of siphoning off Pakistan Rupees 34 million set aside for drawing a new electricity line to the region.

“Our children die of scorching heat and mosquito bites, what difference does it make if they die of polio”, asks Mashal Khan, adding that they would continue our boycott “until the government fulfills our demand”.

Sadly the government has not addressed the basic issue raised by the people of Waziristan but is trying a carrot-and-stick approach to get the polio ban reversed.

This policy saw the local authorities invoke colonial-era legislation to impose collective fines as punishment even as they engage in some sweet talks with the tribal elders.

The Governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Province, officials at the FATA Secretariat and the political agent – a representative of the federal government – in North Waziristan are ‘all attempting to talk to tribal elders and sort out matters so anti-polio drives could resume’, said Mazhar Nisar, health education adviser at the Prime Minister’s Polio Monitoring and Coordination Cell in Islamabad.

FATA heath director Fawad Khan echoed the same view when he said, “We are making what efforts we can to bring the ban to an end, so the anti-polio campaign can resume”.

In December 2012, invoking the collective territorial responsibility clause of the Frontier Crimes Regulation of 1901, Political Agent for North Waziristan, Siraj Ahmed Khan, put in place measures some disincentives like denying passports, national identity cards and other official documentation if community leaders don’t overturn the ban. The notification was issued after the elders of Wazir and Dawar – the two major tribes of North Waziristan declined to back the anti-polio programme.

According to the notification, ban has been imposed on provision of lungi (honorarium given to tribal elders), fresh recruitments of Class IV employees and developmental work till these tribal elders ensure security of teams taking part in the anti-polio campaign.

In South Waziristan also, local Taliban (Maulvi Nazir group) clamped a ban on polio vaccination last May itself, but according to Mazhar Nisar, this ban since been ‘somewhat relaxed’

A doctor, who asked not to be identified, at the hospital in Wana, the administrative centre of South Waziristan, told IRIN, "Generally people are allowed to bring people into the hospital to receive anti-polio drops, but teams are not permitted to move in the field to deliver them."

Some parents are trying to circumvent the ban at great risk, of course, by taking their children to vaccination centers opened along main highway to the tribal heart land. Some are going all the way to Peshawar or Bannu to administer the drops to their children. Peshawar is about 285km from Miranshah. It is not easy to move long distances with children; the militants could find out where a family with little ones is going.