Are these the protests in question? -
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-47147409
Leaving the "what about plight of people in Afghanistan" clause aside, do these protestors have genuine grievances? Their allegations of Pakistan army's abuse of Pashtun people have truth or is it all politically motivated?
There are so many facet to this issue that it's extremely difficult to sum it up while remaining just. At the same time we the pakistani people don't take criticism well and instead of looking at criticism as a mean to improve we become defensive and start pinpointing the shortcomings of others.
For me the answer to the concern whether Pakistan army willingly harms and abuses a group of citizens just because they are Pashtun is a simple no!
The reality is that Pakistan security forces don't shy away from going against any elements which they consider to be a threat to their own self-interests irrespective of the ethnic background. Which wouldn't be a big deal weren't it for the fact that the security forces have little regard to how they conduct such operations. For them the end justifies the means, no matter how bad the means employed. The Sahiwal incident being it's prime example.
Hidden from all the media Pakistani security forces have been conducting a "counter-terrorism" operation in the tribal areas since late 2004. With each passing year army's way of dealing with issues increased in brutality. Which became the mother of all security problems in Pakistan in the last two decades. Now what was the reason behind the initial operation? This is a question which PTM supporters must answer honestly though they aren't willing to. Did the security forces went into tribal areas because of their hate and despise of the tribal Pashtuns or were there legitimate reasons. If it was due to their hatred of Pashtuns why did it took them over 60 years to finally start the opression. If it's the evil Punjabi conspiracy against them then how come the man in charge at the time of troops deployment in FATA was Gen Ehsan-ul-haq a Pashtun from Mardan?
I don't want to indulge deeper into the different ethnicities and start microscopically analyzing which actor in the conflict was of which ethnicity. Because I don't believe in such an approach. I only mentioned the examples to show how shallow claims of abuses purely based on ethnic grounds are.
It is not hard for me to imagine the Pakistani army conducting many brutalities in the tribal areas in their quest to solve the issue and satisfy their big boss. However the motivation for all those brutalities had little to do with the ethnicity of the local population and more to do with the desperation, short-sighted mindset and attitude of those in charge.
I sincerely believe an open public discussion is necessary for a long-term solution to this issue. I think the army should be answerable to the simple citizen listen to the other side, if true admit any atrocities it committed, apologize to those affected and give them proper compensation.
At the same time I find it hard to stand shoulder to shoulder with the PTM folks. Their Pashtun nationalist and ethnic bias is nauseous. They might be addressing legitimate issues but their approach is dishonest and insincere. They will take any story and give it an ethnic twist. For instance in the Sahiwal incident they won't see innocents getting killed just like in FATA. Instead they will see the excessive media coverage and claim look since Punjabis died they get all the attention, while ignoring the fact that there was a strong media censorship in FATA and that the incident happened in broad day light on a busy road with many eye witnesses. They will ignore how initially the security forces tried there best to label all the dead as Terrorists and suppress the issue. Such is the ignorance and bias when one is blinded by strong sense of ethnic nationalism.
This issue is a headache for both the army and PTM folks. Both parties have ugly truth in their closet they don't want the public to see. Though I think army has more to lose if they keep on believing in their policy of forceful suppression, censorship and the use of an iron fist. As a result PTM can only gain as they can openly demonstrate that they indeed "innocent" victims and further mobilize gullible masses.
