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Resources > Global Issues > Afghanistan's... > Educating Afghani... > The Omid Schools > Struggles Over Re...

Struggles Over Registration

NOVEMBER 2004

Godah School, Wardak province (student population: 111)
Noor Khel school, Wardak province (student population: 246)
Zahra primary school, Jalalabad (student population: 197)

Government relations/OMID’s Registration

By November, Omid is still waiting for NGO registration. Like many NGOs, it has been caught in a peculiar power struggle within the government over NGO registration. There are about 2,870 NGOs now working in Afghanistan, and the new government of President Hamid Karzai feels it needs to reassert control. Karzai is not the first leader of a country emerging from war who feels he is not master in his own house when it comes to dealing with NGOs.

Rahela, age 11, a girl from the Godah School

The leading proponent of regulating NGOs is Ramazan Bashar Doost, the Minister of Planning, who circulates a policy paper stating that all new NGO registrations are to be frozen. He also lets it be known that 2,000 NGOs will be struck off the list and forbidden from working in Afghanistan by the end of December. This is assumed to have the support of President Karzai, because no one imagines that such an important document would be published without the president’s approval. There is also some public support for the Minister’s tough line, because many Afghans resent the independence with which NGOs operate in their country. In a September 7 meeting with Ms. Basiri, described earlier in these pages, Minister Doost expressed contempt for NGOs.

But the President then declines to comment publicly on his minister’s paper, prompting a press release from ACBAR, the coordinating group for Afghan NGOs, seeking clarification. The president’s spokesman announces that the cabinet has disapproved of the Minister’s plan, and that he was acting alone. This leads to speculation that President Karzai has been pressured by Western governments and the UN not to make life harder for NGOs. Minister Doost resigns and is not immediately replaced. This is disconcerting for Omid, and other organizations that have submitted applications for registration, who are left in a limbo.

It is proving difficult to register the schools of Fatima Zahra and Godah, where Omid is working. Registration is essential for two reasons. First, as noted earlier, it is required if a school is to receive any official support through the government (for salaries or construction). All foreign governments and multilateral banks are channeling funds for education through the government.

Beating the odds: The vast majority of Afghan girls and women are illiterate. 

Second, Ms. Basiri’s long term plans for Omid are beginning to take shape. She hopes to hand the Omid schools over to the government within three years when her grant runs out. That would be the best way to ensure that the schools are sustainable and that the children receive the same schooling as other Afghan children. But this obviously requires that Omid develop a formal partnership with the government.

On November 17, Ms. Basiri again meets with the director of the Minister of Education, Mr. Maidan Shahr, in Kabul. He says that a letter will be needed before the Godah school can be registered. A week later, Ms. Basiri is also asked for a complete list of teachers and their profiles. She promises to provide them both.

Ms. Basiri’s discussions with the Jalalabad authorities make it clear that the Fatima Zahra school is unlikely to win registration as long as it is so close to the other temporary government school that has been set up to cater to returning refugee families. This is a problem, because the families at Fatima Zahra do not want to move their children into the government school, which has almost no facilities. The government is also digging in its heels. The government school is only supposed to be temporary and last as long as there are refugees. Indeed, this explains why it is not registered. But it could also be a long time before the refugees are all settled. For the time being, then, the Fatima Zahra school seems likely to remain in limbo – providing an education for about 200 girls, but without government registration. 

Ms. Basiri found one educated woman who had worked as a doctor in Godah in the Saudi hospital and was willing to return as a teacher. But she was lured away by the UN, which offered a much higher salary.

Ms. Basiri decides to continue her support for Fatima Zahra, because one of Omid’s goals is to provide education to those in need. In addition, Fatima Zahra is blessed by having excellent women teachers. This is a rarity in Afghanistan - and one of the biggest obstacles to girls’ education in the Godah region. Ms. Basiri has discussed the idea of helping women teachers return from the refugee camps in Pakistan, and it is one of her future goals. But so far it has been impossible to organize anything because of security concerns.

Remants of Afghanistan’s past conflicts litter the countryside.
Ms. Basiri did find one educated woman who had worked as a doctor in Godah in the Saudi hospital and was willing to return as a teacher. But she was lured away by the UN which offered a much higher salary.

Later in November, Ms. Basiri visits Wardak again for a meeting with the teachers, to hear how they assess the year’s work, and discussion about the final examinations.

Communications with The Advocacy Project

Ms. Basiri replies at length to a series of questions from The Advocacy Project team, which met with Ms. Basiri’s main donor in Washington in October. The donor has imposed few conditions on Ms. Basiri, beyond requiring that the girls get a good education. She also trusts AP to use our judgment in how best to support Ms. Basiri.

After several months, we are all still feeling our way. Our intern, Ms. Ginny Barahona, was able to spend some good time with Ms. Basiri in the summer. But Ms. Basiri was still in the process of leaving the Afghan Women’s Network and establishing her own organization, so everything was still very new and quite confused.

Ms. Barahona and Ms. Basiri became close friends, and Ms. Barahona has continued to serve as AP’s point person on this Omid project. Read Ginny Barahona's Afghanistan blog here.

We all agree that Ms. Basiri has done a remarkable job so far. But we also have questions about the budget and work plan, which seems to be forever changing as Ms. Basiri spots another challenge and opportunity. Part of our job is to encourage her to avoid getting overextended – a common failing of charismatic and ambitious NGO leaders.

This will call for more regular communications on both sides. Here, AP is more to blame than Ms. Basiri, who has been submitting detailed monthly reports, in accordance with the methodology agreed with Ms. Barahona since September.

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