They waited for the government to build a girl’s school in their village for nearly two decades, But it was never built. So, they pulled up their sleeves to do something the government was unwilling to unable to do.
Villagers took the matters into their own hands. They began constructing the school building with their own money in Ghasoor village in Shahristan district of Daikundi province. Hundreds of families pledged to contribute something. Some paid money, others provided manpower and construction materials.
The work to build the school which began last year is scheduled to finish this year. A letter received by Rukhshana Media shows dozens of Ghasoor residents signed on it, showing commitment to the project.
“We waited for 18 years and made so many inquiries to the relevant departments to build a girls’ school in this area,” said Abdul Qayum Baigi, a local elder, adding that 110,000 USD was allocated for the construction of the school in 2013. “But it has been nine years and the people have not received a penny.”
Baigi said villagers are building the school with mud because they can’t afford concrete walls.
The school has at least 600 students, but girls above the sixth grade are not allowed to return to their classes due to the Taliban’s ban on their education.
Nasiba, an 18-year-old high school student, said she was happy the community members decided to build the school, despite the fact that she and other girls above sixth grade aren’t allowed to go to school. She said she and other students went through a lot of difficulties in the past years because the school didn’t have classrooms.
“Sometimes we studied in the tents and sometimes under the scorching sun,” she said.
“We call on the Taliban government to allow girls above the sixth grade to study and not to discriminate between girls and boys,” she added. “Everyone has the right to get education, and a Muslim man or woman must study.”
Jawad Bahonar, an education activist, said the move by Ghasoor villagers has a clear message to the Taliban.
“People want their children to be educated, and the Taliban cannot ignore them,” he said.
Daikundi is an impoverished province in central Afghanistan. Of about 164,000 students, 48 percent of them are girls in the province. According to Daikundi’s education department, there are 442 schools in the province and about half of them don’t have building.
A schoolteacher in Daikundi, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the people now understand that they should send their children to school for a bright future. He said the gap between the Taliban’s ideology and what the people want for their children is huge.
“People construct buildings for girls’ schools,” he said, “but the Taliban close the school gates to girls.”
