Life is difficult for Afghan women

MIRIAM and I would talk daily.

Those daily engagements became few and far between.

Earlier this year I had the privilege of accompanying a humanitarian organisation (Africa Muslims Agency) on a trip to Kabul in Afghanistan.

I could never have imagined the fall of Kabul to the Taliban within months of our time there. However, the imminent threat of instability and implosion was inevitable.

Working on the ground with vulnerable families, women (most of them widowed) and children gave us a very real sense of the situation faced by Afghans. The tension on the ground was palpable. The starvation, poverty, and the fight for survival were overwhelming, as was the sense of helplessness.

In the early 2000s I had the opportunity of meeting another young Afghan woman, and in a short space of time we had built a special bond and stayed in touch over two decades.

On hearing that I would go to her country of birth, she was both sad and excited. Sad because she hasn’t been home in almost 20 years, but elated that; in her words: “You care enough to risk everything to go and serve the people of my beloved Afghanistan.”

We stayed in touch and spoke often on my return home as I shared my experience, observations, and the pain and hardship I experienced first-hand. I had so many questions, I was angered by things that I saw, especially the injustice against women and most certainly the girl child. We had several conversations and exchanges as I tried to process what I had seen and experienced. In the months to come she connected me with some of her relatives and friends – women young and old – who I occasionally spoke to in the ensuing months.

In the days that led to the Taliban takeover of Kabul and the whole of Afghanistan from August 15, the women I was in contact with feared for their lives and the safety of their families, and there was a scramble and fight to get out. It is no secret that the women in Afghanistan live painfully difficult lives, of intense hardship, violence and domestic abuse. In 2018, some 80% of all Afghan suicides were women who could not see a way out of the domestic struggle and torment that they found themselves in.

For the weeks that followed I was in touch with Miriam (not her real name) she would send voice-notes and call daily. Every few days she would change SIM cards and I’d receive contact from a handful of different numbers as she feared for her life and couldn’t risk their home being raided and a trace of her contact with what she termed “the world outside”.

Miriam begged me to find a way to get her and her family out of Kabul. She called daily. Her voice-note messages were filled with a terror. There was always shouting and crying in the background. Her family were scared to leave their home for fear of what would happen if they were caught on the streets.

Back in South Africa the international news coverage painted a picture of a new chapter and moment in history for the Taliban and the people of Afghanistan, yet what seemed to be happening on the ground didn’t connect with the media and news conferences being aired across the world.

A promise of a new moment in time for both the Taliban and Afghans is still to be seen.

We made numerous calls to find international NGOS who were evacuating staff, foreign nationals, Afghan citizens and in some cases, families.

This went on for several days and nights and Miriam and I would have conversations that almost felt like they were going in circles, but I knew she needed to share and channel her frustrations, questions, pain, fear of the unknown and certainly her anger.

It was on September 2, when some of the bravest women, some of whom were women’s rights defenders and civil activists, dared to take on the Taliban. They protested against the banning of girl’s education and the imposition of restrictions on their movement. They called for the preservation of their achievements and protection of their education.

At the first demonstration the Taliban did not intervene, but the second one on September 7 saw the Taliban respond in a violent and abusive manner, lashing protesters with whips and firing indiscriminately to disperse the crowds; according to Human Rights Watch.

Women who marched stated they wanted to continue working and didn’t want to have to be chaperoned by a mahram (a man in the family) and schoolgirls above Grade 6 should also be allowed to return to school.

Over the past few weeks contact with Miriam has been challenging.

Knowing what life is like for women in Kabul, it was unnerving when she only made contact days apart and then weeks apart, and sadly, all of a sudden, our communication stopped.

I’ve been unable to reach Miriam or members of her family. I have no idea if she is somewhere in Kabul or if she found a way out that she had so desperately prayed for.

I am not a political analyst or diplomat, but as an international humanitarian who has had the privilege of working on the ground with some of the most marginalised people in many remote parts of the world, I will always look for Miriam and pray she has been able to start a new life, whatever that life is that she so desperately searched for.

The suffering continues at an unprecedented level. Surveys by the World Food Programme (WFP) reveal that nine in 10 Afghan families have insufficient food for daily consumption, half stating they have run out of food at least once in the past two weeks.

One in three Afghans is acutely hungry. And the United Nations Children’s Fund reported that 3.2 million children under the age of 5 are expected to suffer from acute malnutrition by the end of the year.

At least one million of these children are at risk of dying due to severe acute malnutrition without immediate treatment.

According to WFP surveys; 95% of households in Afghanistan are not consuming enough food, even adults are eating less and skipping meals so that their children can eat.

I will not forget my time in Kabul and can’t forget the pain and brokenness of the women and children I spent time with. Never before, no matter the circumstances and extreme poverty, have I ever seen a people with no hope in their eyes.

Children are growing up with the generational pain of a country at war, carrying that anguish and the intensity of an empty, dark future in their eyes.

The eyes of children don’t know happiness so when they feel it, even for a moment, they are unsure what to do or how to express it as it is such a foreign concept for them.

They live below the poverty line and don’t know how old they are or where the closest school is because all they can focus on is how they will bring home enough for their family to eat, and often, that is only every few days.

It is impossible to come back home without having left a part of myself behind.

We can only pray and hope that Afghanistan will rise and take its rightful place in the world.

Afghanistan needs to protect human rights, the rule of law, and create a thriving economic space where men and women are given equal opportunities.

Women must have freedom movement, and the right to education without any constraints, terms or conditions.

I will continue searching for Miriam and one day I pray to return to Afghanistan and finish what I started.