NOTE: This is the latest in a series of special reports sent to me from a correspondent inside Afghanistan. I am withholding his identity to protect his safety.
Dear David:
Like in many poor countries, one of Afghanistan’s long-standing problems is corruption in the distribution of foreign aid. The Taliban didn’t create this problem but they have done nothing to address it, either. As a result, it is getting worse under their rule.
A man named Qurban is 60 years old and lives with his three children and his wife in a damp earthen house in the city of Lashkargah. He works in a store for a salary of $50 per month, which is not sufficient to meet his family’s basic needs. Yet he has never received any aid from the NGOs (Non Governmental Organizations) that have been operating in Helmand Province for years.
Unfortunately, Qurban’s case is typical. Some $40 million in humanitarian aid flows into Afghanistan every week, and is said to be deposited in a commercial bank not accessible to the Taliban. The United Nations uses this distribution method in Afghanistan to try to prevent the government from favoritism as to who gets the aid.
But the local people I interviewed complain that the distribution of aid remains biased and unfair. Gholam is a construction worker who has been unemployed for more than four months. He complains that although he lives in utter poverty, he has not received any help at all. He says that in Lashkargah aid is only given to people who are close to the high-ranking Taliban families in the area.
Another resident, Nasir, says he received aid once last year, and described for me the process of getting it as follows: “First, I went to the mayor of Helmand to receive a letter of approval. After three days of going back and forth, I received the paper in which it was confirmed by the mayor that I am among those in need of assistance. I took that card to the World Food Programme representative office and got another card. The date of receipt of aid was mentioned in that card. On the promised date, I received 50 kilos of wheat flour, 20 kilos of rice and 5 liters of oil.”
Even though he was successful that one time, Nasir says he is unhappy that the aid is distributed based on the approval of the mayor, who is in the Taliban, and not based on the severity of the need. He says the mayor gives preference to his relatives and supporters.
The distribution of aid is unfair not only at the individual level but also at the geographical level. For example, I asked the local people in one of Bamyan’s villages how many of them have received help. They answered that out of more than a thousand families living in their village, none of them have received help from local or international organizations. They say the aid is distributed only to the places that the Taliban want.
A man I interviewed named Baryalai is an employee of the International Rescue Committee. He says that the IRC is forced to give in to the demands of the Taliban; otherwise they will prevent the distribution of the aid altogether.
In addition, Baryalai said there gross favoritism in the process of hiring employees of the NGO. People are hired based on the relationship they have with people already inside the IRC, which has resulted in a workforce of more than two thousand employees with only one Hazara. The rest are all Pashtuns, who are the primary ethnic group supporting the Taliban.
This ethnic discrimination has a long history predating the Taliban. In his book School for Conflict or for Peace in Afghanistan, Dana Burde explains that under U.S. supervision, approximately 80 percent of the aid was distributed to Pashtun areas of Afghanistan, despite that group accounting for less than 40 percent of the population, in order to try and convince the local people not to join the Taliban.
These days it is fair to say that the general public here believes that the NGOs controlling aid are even more corrupt than the previous government under U.S, supervision. Aid does not reach the needy and hiring is not based on meritocracy. None of this results in the improvement of people's lives.
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