PRT QALAT: PROGRESS ON WOMEN'S ISSUES--ONE STEP AT

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KABUL 000395

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TAGS: PREL PGOV AF
SUBJECT: PRT QALAT: PROGRESS ON WOMEN'S ISSUES--ONE STEP AT
A TIME


1. (U) SUMMARY: By their actions and through a series of
meetings with the PRT, local women have expressed their
desire for employment, education, and security in southern
Zabul province. Key players for women's activities in Zabul
are the Directorate of Women's Affairs (DOWA),two women
Provincial Council members, and the director of the
provincial capital Qalat girls, school. The DOWA director
has been ineffective, and rivalries among all the women
leaders impede progress in advancing women's causes. The
girls' school in the provincial capital is filled with 1,100
students and is running smoothly. The PRT is working
actively to help local women become more engaged in
activities that will provide them with new skills; however,
perceived security concerns are an obstacle to engaging them
in such activities. END SUMMARY.

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Women Members Active in Provincial Council
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2. (U) The Zabul Provincial Council (PC) includes two women.
The third woman-designated slot on the council is currently
vacant because no other women submitted their names for
election. The two women council members are active in PC
activities. They recently expressed their interest in
attending the weekly Provincial Development Council meetings
but noted that they felt that they would not be welcomed
there by other (male) provincial leaders. Zabul's UNAMA
representative has encouraged them to attend these meetings
and has engaged with the Governor to try and ensure they are
included.

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Qalat Girls, School Filled with 1100 Students
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3. (U) The girls, school in Qalat is open and according to
the school director, there are currently about 1100 students
and 27 teachers at the school. (Note: The PRT built the
school with the PRT Commander's Emergency Reconstruction
Program Funds. The school cost approximately USD 150,000 to
build. End Note). Students range from 7 to 22 years in age
and are enrolled in grades one through nine. Not
surprisingly, given the prohibitions during the Taliban
years, the largest classes are comprised of the younger
students; there are 395 students (approximately twenty five
percent) in the first grade, but only nine students in the
ninth grade. The teachers are not all professionals, and the
majority are not from Zabul province. The teachers, which
include three males, stated that they are usually paid on
time; they receive USD 50 per month. Classes are taught in a
variety of subjects, including religion, physics, Dari, math,
history and English. During a December visit to the school,
the PRT observed the higher grades in the middle of their
exams; the lower grades were already out on winter break,
with the higher grades soon to follow. Depending on the
weather, classes are scheduled to resume mid-February.

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Women Want to Work But Lack Skills, Opportunity
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4. (U) Local women have repeatedly expressed their desire to
work to PRToff, but most do not have the training or
experience to do anything more than the most menial tasks.
Currently, the only viable opportunity for work outside the
home is at the World Food Program-supported Green Afghanistan
Initiative (GAIN) center plant nursery, where approximately
85 to 100 women receive basic agricultural training and then
cultivate plants, nuts and trees. Last month, the GAIN
center implemented a literacy program, where women can take
classes after work. The PRT paid a visit to the GAIN center
and observed approximately forty women in the training room
learning to read. After twenty one days of work (and class,
if desired),they are paid, in kind, with basic foodstuffs
such as wheat, vegetable oil, salt and nuts. Apart from this
group, very few, if any, local women work outside the home.

KABUL 00000395 002 OF 003


The women Provincial Council members suggested that women
would be willing to work at a factory if one existed, but (as
PRToff pointed out) there would first have to be a viable
industry that could sustain a factory. Such a project would
also require better infrastructure, including transport, as
well as a training program for the labor force. In short, it
should be seen as a long term objective.

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PRT-Sponsored Training Programs Help Women
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5. (U) The PRT is keenly aware of the influence that women in
the province hold, especially within their families.
Therefore, it shows its support by providing women of all
ages with basic tools that serve as a first step towards
making positive changes for them and their families. Working
with the Director of Education and Gulnar, the PRT will soon
begin a program to teach basic first aid, hygiene and family
care to women at the hospital. Additionally, a local woman
teaches rug weaving and embroidery to young women in her
home. This class was originally part of the PRT-run trade
school, but due to security concerns it is now taught as an
extension class. At the request of the women leaders, the
PRT built a suggestion box and delivered it to the girls,
school, where women in Qalat can anonymously deliver
suggestions and complaints to women leaders. In a recent
meeting, the women complained that they do not have the
opportunity to travel to other districts to see and talk to
women outside the provincial capital. Two days later, the
PRT invited women PC members to travel to Mizan district via
helicopter as the PRT accompanied Governor Arman to the
district center to hold a meeting with local leaders, with
the hope that they would arrange a woman's meeting as well.
The women initially said they would travel to Mizan, but they
canceled the day before the trip without explanation.

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Women's Resource Center Is Focus for the Future
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6. (U) The PRT is working on a plan to make the Women's
Resource Center not only functional, but, indeed, the center
of women's activities in Qalat. The PRT will equip the
Center with computers and plans to provide computer training.
It also intends to move the courses currently being taught
at the girls, school and the rug weaving and embroidery
being taught in a private home to the center. The hope is
for the Women's Resource Center to become regarded as a place
where all women can feel safe as they acquire the skills that
will allow them to work within their communities and aid
their families.

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Director of Women's Affairs Is Ineffective
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7. (U) The focal point of women's activities in Zabul
province should be the Directorate of Women's Affairs (DOWA),
headed by Dr. Gulnar. Until recently, Dr. Gulnar had been an
ineffective director at best, and an active obstructionist at
worst. She has spent a great deal of time away from Zabul,
usually in Kabul. While away, she is impossible to contact.
She claims to have a representative that can act in her stead
while she is gone, but in practice that does not happen and
little gets done during her absences. There recently has
been improvement, with Gulnar engaging with PRTOff on a
variety of issues, including the start of a women's health
education course.


8. (U) USAID recently funded the construction of a Women's
Resource Center in the provincial capital Qalat, which was
completed in September 2006. Gulnar and her staff have yet
to move into the building and, until recently, despite
constant encouragement, took very little interest in making
it a functioning and sustainable center for women in the
province. Gulnar has recently agreed to hold an opening of

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the building in February and then hold the celebration for
International Woman's Day on March eighth in the center. She
has also agreed that the computers the PRT is purchasing
should go into the center and that computer and other courses
should take place in the center.

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Fighting Among Women Leaders Hinders Progress
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9. (U) Ironically, an obstacle to progress for women is the
animosity that exists among the key women leaders in the
province. The PC women members believe that Gulnar is
ineffective, and allege that she is not using her budget
properly. They assert that she is giving donated items
intended for women to men in Zabul instead. They said that
they were lobbying the governor to pressure Gulnar to step
down as Director of Women's Affairs and go back to being a
medical doctor. The women PC members have a personal grudge
against the director of the girls, school, apparently
stemming from a family dispute. The first time the PRT
visited the girls, school, accompanied by the women PC
members, the school director attempted to bar the PC members
from entering. They were eventually allowed in, but the
tension in the room was palpable. There is a marked
difference in the dynamics of meetings depending on which
women are present.

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Perceptions of Inadequate Security Impedes Progress
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10. (U) The women's perception of a lack of security is an
obstacle to making progress on women's issues in Zabul
province. For the past six months, women have refused to
attend classes held at the PRT compound or even to meet with
PRT officers there due to personal safety concerns. In a
November meeting, DOWA director Gulnar and the two women PC
members asked the PRT to supply them with personal weapons.
Having a weapon, they said, would increase their comfort
level as they walk around the city. The three women recently
reiterated this request, explaining that the Taliban have
come to houses in Qalat at night and told husbands not to let
their wives go out. (Note: These women did not say the
Taliban have come to their own homes, just that Taliban come
to houses at night in general. End Note.) When asked what
could be done to improve security for women, they suggested
that police should be hired from their home village to
protect their village. (Note: This is the intent behind the
auxiliary police program currently being implemented in Zabul
and encouraged by the PRT. End note.)

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COMMENT
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11. (SBU) Zabul province provides a snapshot of the
challenges facing women, women's leaders and advocates, and
programs for women across Afghanistan. There is progress,
but it is slow. Pushing for more than the system can bear at
a particular moment is counterproductive, but the PRTs and
the Embassy look for opportunities to push the agenda in
every province and with the central government. END COMMENT.
NEUMANN