Bistandsmilliarderne er helt overvejende gået til de dele af det centralasiatiske land, hvor de militære kampe står, mens folk i andre regioner nok er ludfattige, men stort set ikke ser en bistandsdollar.
PASHTUN KOT, 26 March 2012 (IRIN) – One hillside in Pashtun Kot District in the northern Afghan province of Faryab stands out.
Dotted with graves, it is the final resting place for the victims of underdevelopment: Villagers travel from far-off mountains by donkey to bury their dead here – people whose demise (bortgang) was hastened by chronic hunger, undernutrition and lack of access to health care.
The most recent addition, according to a village elder and member of the district `shura’ council, Mullah Najibullah, was a 30-year-old mother of two, victim of a chronic cough (hoste) and probably an illness she never knew she had.
Villagers here face harsh winters without warm clothes or heaters.
They have to walk to the city (Maimana, capital of Faryab Province) to collect water. Hit by drought over the last few years, they sometimes eat only one meal a day. Meat is out of reach for many of these farming communities. Mobile phone coverage is patchy.
International donors have poured a stunning 57 billion US dollar into Afghanistan since 2001, much of it into the volatile (voldshærgede) southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand as part of the international forces’ “hearts and minds” strategy in their fight against insurgents (taliban).
“No development projects come here”
But residents of northern Afghanistan complain they have not benefited fairly from development aid.
“In the south, there is fighting; many people have been killed; and millions of dollars go there,” Najibullah told IRIN at the edge of the graveyard, adding:
“But we keep calm and support our government, so no development projects come here. People are unhappy about this.”
The gradual drawdown of US-NATO troops, and the planned handover of full security responsibilities to Afghan forces in 2014, has had the aid community worried about a corresponding drop in aid funds.
But many aid workers also see the transition as an opportunity to reset aid delivery in Afghanistan, which for too long, they say, has been channelled through the NATO-led Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) and driven by short-term political and military objectives.
“A lot of countries have focused efforts in areas where their troops have been operating, or where it has been easier to operate, instead of looking at it from a needs-based approach,” said Aidan O’Leary, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Afghanistan.
“Going forward… the people who are most vulnerable have to be at the forefront of the agenda,” noted he.
Uneven aid
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http://www.irinnews.org/Report/95160/Analysis-Why-the-aid-drawdown-in-Afghanistan-could-be-a-good-thing
