08/21/2002

“War always starts in the periphery and moves to the center; but when good things come, they always start at the center and move out. By the time it gets to the periphery, the assistance is very diluted.”—Dr. Al-Umara

Dr. Al-Umara, the founder and director of an Afghan local NGO called the Welfare and Development Organization (WDO), recently visited Washington, DC on a mission to raise awareness and support for the development initiatives of local NGOs in Afghanistan. In a briefing at Refugees International, she highlighted some new problems that have arisen as a result of international “solutions” to Afghanistan’s crisis. In addition, she advocated that more effective assistance to the whole of Afghanistan could be directed through the international support of local NGOs.

As the situation in Afghanistan now stands, the international community has expressed its commitment to supporting Afghanistan’s new government. The United Nations organizations, the international financial institutions, and as many as 150 international NGOs have flooded into Kabul to offer assistance in the reconstruction process. In addition, the international community has promised $4.5 billion assistance to Afghanistan for its rehabilitation over the next 30 months. Of this sum $1.8 billion was planned for spending in the first year.

However, according to Al-Umara, the majority of Afghans are seeing few concrete improvements from the international aid effort because the aid that is being provided is concentrated in Kabul and in the north, the political stronghold of the Northern Alliance that overthrew the Taliban government with U.S. support. Contributing to this disparity, the government of Afghanistan requires local NGOs to get approval for receiving foreign funds. Unfortunately, in many cases government officials favor individuals and groups because of their ethnic and geographic background when granting the required endorsement letter. As a result, relatively little assistance is reaching southern regions of the country, areas dominated by the Pashtun ethnic group that formed the backbone of previous Afghan governments, including that of the Taliban. If rural areas continue to be ignored, and if the Afghan government is making aid decisions based on ethnic politics, resentment will build among those who feel marginalized, potentially leading to dire consequences for Afghanistan.

Further exacerbating a difficult situation, WDO and other local NGOs find themselves in competition with international NGOs in their efforts to assist Afghans. Now in its third office space, WDO was evicted on two previous occasions after better-funded international NGOs offered to pay much higher rents. While international NGOs are willing to pay as much as $3,000 per month, local NGOs like WDO struggle to come up with $300 a month for comparable space. WDO carries on its work in the hope that they will not be evicted yet again.

Another frustration is maintaining qualified staff. When WDO recruits and trains a new staff member, chances are high that international NGOs will woo the now well-qualified person into a higher paying job in their organizations. Having lost three of her best-trained staff in this way, Al-Umara says she sees the value of sharing expertise, but not at the expense of undermining local NGOs’ capacity to operate.

The key to reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, according to Al-Umara, is in increased partnership, rather than continued competition, between local and international NGOs. International organizations have access to funding that local NGOs lack, while local NGOs have years of experience working within Afghanistan that the international community would be wise to further utilize.

The benefits of working with local NGOs are numerous. Their staffs already know the culture, they have established relationships within the community, and they know how to work with and around the warlords who continue to influence Afghan policy, though now under the guise of an internationally recognized government. Taking an “if you can’t beat them, work with them” attitude, Al-Umara asserts that warlordism will not be eradicated from Afghanistan any time soon, but she does not view this as a problem per se. Even during Taliban rule, WDO was able to build and open an all-girls’ school with the permission of the warlords. If this was possible, then certainly much could be accomplished now under the new regime that offers wider freedoms and more opportunities.

The international community needs to ensure that many local groups get the opportunity to benefit from links to international support. Token funding to a few favored local groups will not be sufficient to turn the tide. New and emerging NGOs in particular have had difficulty being recognized by international NGOs who prefer to work only with their regular “clients.” What is needed is for international NGOs in Afghanistan to play a larger role in identifying and endorsing legitimate and effective local NGOs to be recipients of international aid. Training and the open exchange of information with more groups, without playing favorites, would also be beneficial to the building of partnerships. If the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and certain international NGOs provided more direct funding support to effective local organizations, this would likely result in programs being initiated more rapidly in rural areas.

Certainly, an increased international effort to support the work of local NGOs would not be without challenges. Concerns have been raised that local NGOs are not well equipped to manage too much money too fast. To curtail potential corruption, accountability structures and monitoring of programs would be essential.

Challenges to partnership are inevitable, but supporting local NGOs to extend international assistance beyond Kabul should be an important component of the international relief and reconstruction strategy in Afghanistan.