KABUL (SW) – Hassamuddin, one of many laborers sitting on sides of roads in Kabul, says that he has been looking for work from alley to alley every morning, but he could not find job.
He, who is a resident of Kabul’s Shorbazar area, said that after Eid al-Adha, he has not been able to get any job even for a day. Hassamuddin said: “We are eight people in the house. We haven’t had morning tea yet. I came at five in the morning, so far there is no work and no income. We haven’t paid the rent for two to three months. We are waiting for a job to be found.”
He emphasized that due to not finding a job, most days, he takes home a few loaves of bread that people help him out of compassion.
Raz Mohammad, a laborer and a resident of Taymani, Kabul, said that after the collapse of the Republic, he cannot find a sustainable job and meets his family’s needs mostly by borrowing. He adds: “This year, I got a job only one day. Someone might give in charity few loaves of bread, we are 10 people at home. I owe two and a half lakh afghanis to people. We spend our days in debt and begging. We sleep hungry most nights.”
In the same way, Nahdat, who is waiting for work on the street with her six-year-old daughter, to find a job in the Taimani district of Kabul city, said that during the day, he is looking for work and her daughter sits near the bakeries and asks people for bread. He adds: “We always endure hunger, God is witness that we only eat dry bread twice.”
Meanwhile, Abdurrahman Habib, the spokesman of the Ministry of Economy, says that the ministry has tried to provide permanent work to the needy. He added: “The priority of our work is to pay attention to infrastructure projects. For example, 12 companies and production enterprises were activated last year and 40 people were provided with work in them.”
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) recently released a report saying that the number of needy people in Afghanistan has increased from 28.8 million to 29.2 million.
ENDS
