Indigenous leaders allege that the government does not want to implement the landmark peace pact that ended decades of bush war in the region as it does not believe in the empowerment of the hills people.

But the government can not scrap it because of pressures from donor agencies and the international community.

"Their position is very clear--they would neither reject nor implement it," says Jyotirindra Bodhipriya Larma, chairman of the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samity (PCJSS) with which the past Awami League government signed the peace pact on 2 December 1997.

"They are just lingering the issue," Larma, better known as Shantu Larma, told The Daily Star.

"The government has been violating the pact wherever and whenever it can."

He described the appointment of BNP lawmaker Wadud Bhuiyan, seen as a leader of Bangalee settlers, as the chairman of the CHT Development Board as a violation of the pact that prefers a highlander in the position.

Ethnic leaders in Larma's rival camp also share the same view. "The government would have surely scrapped the treaty if the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) or the donors were not watching the whole thing," said a leader of the United People's Democratic Front (UPDF).

Back in 1997 when the deal was signed, the BNP and the Jamaat-e-Islami, key constituents of the current coalition government, vehemently opposed it, terming it as a serious threat to Bangladesh's independence and sovereignty. After taking office, they did not change their views and sat on the deal implementation.

The stagnation has eroded 25 lakh hills people's trust in the peace agreement. Over the years, the anti-peace deal outfit UPDF has found support among the ethnic communities amid a law and order slide.

At the same time, seven lakh Bangalee settlers emerged as 'specially preferred' community in the eyes of the hills people.

The settlers launched their own movement, Parbatya Samo Adhikar Andolan (Equal Rights Movement), for permanent settlement and cancellation of the agreement.

Even the Deputy Minister for the CHT Affairs Moni Swapan Dewan says he is not clear whether the government wants to implement the deal or not. "Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has directed Local Government, Rural Development and Coopera-tives Minister Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan to look into the issue," he said.

"Let us see, what happens. I'm just trying to develop my constituency with my limited powers and resources."

Mannan Bhuiyan, also chairman of the cabinet committee on the CHT affairs, declines to comment on the deal.

The signing of the peace agreement raised the spirits of the indigenous people who thought it would change their fate and uphold their rights.

But hopes soon gave way to despair as the past AL government and the present coalition paid little attention to the implementation of the pact in the last six years.

In the last two and a half years after taking office, the present government sat with the leaders of the PCJSS for talks, especially with Shantu Larma who threatened to launch a continued movement in last December on the eve of the sixth signing anniversary of the pact.

The PCJSS came up with a set of demands that included proper implementation of the CHT peace accord, removal of Wadud, withdrawal of security camps from the CHT region and appointment of a full minister to the CHT affairs ministry.

The government agreed to hand over three institutions of the CHT region -- the vocational training institute, cotton development board and primary education training institute -- to the district council in line with the peace agreement in a decision which is yet to be implemented.

Hills people allege that local BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami have put up Samo Adhikar Andolan at the instigation of Wadud to counter the demands of pro-peace deal ethnic group. But the four-party alliance and the government keep mum about the platform or their activities.

The only tangible result of the pact is the setting up of some offices including the regional council, Chittagong Hill Tracts Refugee Rehabilitation Affairs and land commission.