Interview with Reconstruction Minister Dr Amin Farhang

As Minister of Reconstruction, Dr Amin Farhang has the herculean task of rebuilding his country’s shattered infrastructure. Born in Kabul in 1938 and educated at the University of Cologne in Germany, this former professor of economics and development at Bochum University has been Afghanistan’s minister of reconstruction since the establishment of the interim government in Bonn last year. QUESTION: How would you describe the current state of reconstruction in your country? ANSWER: The reconstruction process at this point is not satisfactory. Promises made in accordance to the Tokyo reconstruction conference have yet to be fulfilled. In total, the donor countries promised US $4.5 billion for the next five years for Afghanistan, including $1.8 billion for 2002. Of this $1.8 billion, $600 million were given to the United Nations, $600 million for the NGOs, and only $90 million was given to the government of Afghanistan. This is not enough for the projects we have. Q: Has the pace of reconstruction slowed in recent months? A: In terms of the projects that the government has been working on, it has been very, very slow. Afghans returning from Pakistan and Iran, however, have been resilient in providing for themselves. During a recent visit to the Shomali plains, I noted that the hands of the returnees and local people - not the government - had initiated 80 percent of the work that had been completed. While of course they received help from NGOs and other organisations, the fact is that many of these people are doing things themselves. Many of these people built their own houses. And, as a government, we are ashamed at seeing this. Q: What are the main priorities for reconstruction now? A: As far as the government is concerned, our main priority is road reconstruction. Afghanistan is a landlocked nation, surrounded on all sides. Consequently, we are dependent on our roads for the transport of goods throughout the country. Two weeks ago, during our meetings in New York, I personally spoke to [President George W.] Bush, who promised $210 million for road reconstruction for Afghanistan, which will hopefully be arriving in the month of October. Q: Given your financial constraints, how capable are you of achieving your goals now? A: We have two alternatives. First, we wait for the help that the international community has promised. However, as we are committed to the reconstruction process, if they don’t come through, we will have to do it ourselves via loans. This, of course, would be a great shame to the countries that made such promises. The second alternative lies in private investment. We have a lot of projects to offer to private companies, and have already granted permission to some 600 companies to operate here. The government has already passed the necessary legislation on private investment.

Minister of Reconstruction, Dr Amin Farhang

Q: Do you feel the international community fully understands the importance of your efforts? A: While the international community knows and understands our efforts, at the same time they have strong reservations and concerns – particularly in the area of security. They want a 100 percent secure Afghanistan, which is not possible. No place in the world today can offer such a thing – including Europe and America. Keep in mind, Afghanistan has been at war for 23 years. It’s simply not possible to ensure that [security] at this point. However, we have secured large areas of the country where a great deal of projects can be undertaken. Once we pass, start and finish projects, employment can be created, and this in itself creates greater security in the country as well. Q: What in your view over the past few months has been your ministry’s greatest success? A: In the past few months, we have prepared and offered a list of our projects and their priorities for the international community. However, as of yet, we haven’t undertaken any real large-scale projects for the Afghan people - projects that give the people confidence in what the government is doing. We have done some visible projects to demonstrate to the people that we are doing something, but these have been small in nature. Such projects might include road reconstruction and the erecting of streetlights, but we need to undertake larger projects. At the moment, we have five large-scale projects under our hands. These include one dealing with the Kabul water supply, as well as the establishment of a textile and [a] concrete factory. Once we complete such a project, we will be presenting solid evidence of our efforts to the Afghan people. We have prepared a list of our projects for the people and for the donors for the upcoming donor conference on 13 and 14 October in Kabul. And we have drafted a development budget for these projects, which we will be presenting then. Q: With winter fast approaching, what is the focus of your attention right now? A: We have drawn up a winterisation project, which the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development is overseeing, with the assistance of the UN, NGOs and donor countries. We have prepared plans to bring food and other priority items to people living in remote, inaccessible areas, but also to those people who have just repatriated back. As I mentioned earlier, we need to keep the roads clear during the winter months to ensure efficient and effective supply routes. As part of this programme, we have $44-million worth of work just to keep the roads open and provide non-food-related items to people in need. Once the roads are blocked, these people will be inaccessible and they will die without our help. So again, our top priority is to keep these roads open, and we have big programmes for snow clearance on this issue. Q: Many Afghans continue to flood the country’s urban areas. What impact is that having on basic infrastructure in the country? A: Another top priority for us was to re-establish a basic infrastructure in rural and remote areas so that when people repatriated to those areas, they remain there. And we should have done that, and we are still trying to do that – to keep the people in these areas so that they don’t move into the cities. Once they come to or around the cities, this results in the development of slum areas, making our task as the government even more difficult to sustain. Q: What are the main infrastructure issues in the cities? A: We have done a great deal of work in four sectors. In the area of education, we established plans for educating one and half million people throughout the country. However, that number is now closer to three million, so resources are insufficient. Regarding urban issues, electricity is a major one. Large areas of cities like Kabul didn’t have electricity, but now they do. Of course, it is less electricity because of the drought, but at least we have the possibility now. Thirdly, this ministry has been very active in the area of public health [in the cities], assisting hospitals to reach higher standards. And lastly, the fourth area I should like to mention is that we changed the sad face of Kabul to a happy one. Kabul is definitely a different city now than it was a year earlier. In our view, the psychological wellbeing of the people is part of our country’s infrastructure. As a result of our activities, women have thrown away their burqas. You now see more women without burqas than with. You see boys and girls wearing nice clothes. This was definitely not the case before. Just in our ministry alone, there are some 50 women working now whereas they were banned from working before. Q: Recently, Lakhdar Brahimi, Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, said Kabul could no longer absorb any more returnees. Do you share this view? A: Yes. However, I should note we had warned the United Nations before – last year – that people would not come slowly to the cities, but in large numbers all at once. They needed to prepare for that actuality, but now, as you see, despite our warnings, we now face this difficulty. The cities of Afghanistan simply cannot sustain such large-scale returns. Kabul cannot afford to take any more. The fact of the matter is, we are now seeing people who have just recently repatriated now returning to Pakistan and Iran as a result. This is a very negative development indeed.