National December 12, 2020 KOHAT: Demanding the status of a separate province for the merged areas, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) chief Maulana Fazlur Rahman alleged on Friday that the government merged the former tribal areas into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under pressure from the United States (US). “If granting provincial status to Gilgit-Baltistan can be discussed, why not the ex-Fata, which has more population than GB,” he said while addressing a public gathering at Abbas Chowk in Darra Adamkhel. He said that the issue of the merger was not discussed in the Parliament. “The government is taking such steps to alienate its own people,” he remarked. He alleged that the government did a great injustice to the tribal people by merging the former tribal areas into KP.