A 22- year old Afghan girl was the last person to make it to the finish line of the world's women's 100- meter running competition in Paris last week. Lina Azimi was hailed not because she won the race. She was applauded because she was an Afghan woman, member of a group of human beings who has suffered for many years for the wrong reasons by the wrong people. Now she was standing among her equals at a world arena representing the determination of Afghan women to fight for their rights for their appropriate place in the society.

It is not that Afghan women enjoyed all their human rights before the dark age of the Taleban regime, but it was during their most oppressive rule that Afghan women suffered the most. It was the Taleban who were morally weaklings themselves as male Mullas who could not control or suppress their carnal desires and who sought refuge from their inner demons by placing the blame on women. That is one of the reasons why they had placed restrictions on women and their behavior. That is also why they had forbidden women from ever leaving their homes without a close male relative chaperon meaning spouse, parents or siblings. This was also the reason why they wanted women to be clad in all covering Burqa. Girl schools were closed and women were deprived of walking conspicuously by wearing high heals, the sound of which might attract attention of the lust dominated minds of the male Taleban. While old Freud was all smiles in his grave over the Taleban edicts against women and their imposition of rules about men who must wear beards, a ruling clique in their own homeland took hostage the women in Afghanistan.

And then there was a liberating attack on Afghan soil by thousands of tons of explosives that showered from the blue skies of the country on Taleban positions by US warplanes guided by the most advanced war technology that made the bearded Taleban either to surrender or chase their own beards into Pakistani territory from whence they had originated. Al-Qaeda was defeated in Afghanistan and its many bases leased to them by Taleban were dismantled. Now was the time for peace, for security, for upholding of human rights of every individual citizen and especially the rights of the oppressed women of Afghanistan. To return their rights to them, social organizations, aid agencies, friendly countries, the United Nations system and especially the United States and Europe were ready to invest millions of Dollars into women's projects. The NGO's not only welcomed the situation, they went ahead and rewrote their own objectives giving prominence to their goal of helping women. The name "woman" in any project guaranteed input of millions of Dollars.

Of the more than 1000 or so NGO's in Afghanistan a great percentage abandoned their older objectives of helping with agriculture and cottage industries and the like and took up huge education projects for educating the deprived women and girls of Afghanistan. Caravans of air-conditioned British made Land Rovers and Japanese Land Cruisers and the like with tinted glass raised huge clouds of dust as their passengers, NGO country experts, met with village leaders and town representatives mostly in warlord land with promises of new school buildings, equipment, educational material and financial help to hire qualified teachers. All of this to make up for the oppression inflicted upon the deprived women and girls in Afghanistan. The world donor agencies thinking that the new Afghan government was incapable of any reconstruction or development program filled the coffers of the NGO's instead. Probably because they are more visible, their freshly painted logos on their brand new jeeps do attract attention and their workers are true country specialists with profound experience of the country because of their past visits of days, weeks or even a few months that make them super specialists of Afghan affairs.

Some sample activity did take place with no coordination with either the government or sister agencies doing the same thing. The Ministry of Women's Affairs remained in isolation and the Ministry of Education left everything to the NGO's and international agencies as long as they sang the praises of the ministry officials.

Today in Afghanistan, where bearded government officials wear their beards not because of compulsion, but probably out of the profound fear of the Taleban, there are schools that operate in name only. There are students who sit on the floor. There are classes that do not even have a black board. There are schools that do not have books. There are students who have no pencils and no papers. There are classes without walls that are held in tents. There are up to four classes held under one small tent and where students in other classes and thus all the students, study in a state of confusion overhear each teacher. And there are still those brand new Cruisers and Rovers jeeps that visit frequently to take pictures with students and staff. School officials, teachers and local representatives have frequently reiterated their need and have said that of the aid promised they have only seen the huge cloud of dust raised upon the return of the NGO jeeps from their locations.

But the aid agencies still boast of true help they have rendered and are rendering. In Kabul there is an Afghan woman, who out of her kind heart, has taken upon herself to safeguard the rights of five girls who may other wise be victim to the cruelty of the society. So, she has raised money, a little more than one hundred thousand Dollars, to serve as chaperon to the girls, taking them to school and back to their homes. She is hopeful of raising more money next year so that she could render more services to the five girls under her project. The population of Afghanistan today is estimated at 26 million and women make more than half of that figure. She has saved the rights of five young women. She is a hero of sorts! She will be welcomed abroad as a brave woman and she would be showered with money for her project that saves five individuals' rights. There is no definition as to which rights of these individuals she is safeguarding.

Only yesterday a group of women were crowding the gates of the Ministry of Women's affairs just to inquire why the Ministry headed by a famous Afghan woman had sacked them. She had sacked 100 women the day before without explaining the reasons for the action. Many of these women are the bread earners of their families and they were in the employ of their government's Women's Services. The Minister is quoted as saying that she had to affect the sackings because she does not find a chance to put the skills of the women into use. Many of these women were skilled in arts and crafts. One woman was a seamstress. During this era of reconstruction in Afghanistan, the Minister of Women's Affairs cannot usefully place a seamstress. That is what is being done to the cause of the oppressed Afghan women by a department in the transitional government entrusted with the task of finding remedies to the country's ills.

Yet the easiest way to raise funds for NGO projects and aid programs is to name them after the cause of women and girls. Add the word children and better your chances of getting more than you have asked for in the way of money and materials. After all, this is aid money and aid money to developing world does not need to be accounted for. It is like money used for the military or by the military. No questions asked. But in this case you can show a smiling picture of a child or a little girl with a book in her hand to drive your point home that your project is up and alive!

While actually what is needed in Afghanistan is a fundamental desire to take up reconstruction and development projects seriously and funding of result oriented projects where the success of a project is measurable and the expenditures in the project are accountable. There is also a need to strengthen the Afghan Ministry for Women's Affairs to be able to evaluate the situation more scientifically and to take control of finding and applying of true remedies to the problems facing Afghan women.

Afghan women deserve all the help and sympathy that can be accorded them even during this so called era of liberation as they are not truly liberated and as their rights are still being trampled upon by a male dominated culture and by male officials of the country's own government as evidenced by recent human rights watch groups. 8/25/03