Women engineers find it is getting harder to work in Afghanistan.
“Years back my business was good but as corruption increased and some Members of Parliament and cabinet ministers opened NGOs (non-governmental organisations) and companies, our access to projects became difficult,” says engineer Sharifa Hamrah who has a master’s degree from Tajikistan and set up Surab Ali Construction Company (SACC) in 2003.
Although she has a record of successful implementation of construction projects in the provinces including Kabul – her company has built schools under a UNDP project – she is now faced with proving that she can do as well as any man in the construction industry. In addition, there are barriers like the difficult security situation, cultural limitations that are put on Afghan women, and family problems.
The Ministry of Urban Development and Housing has 10 ongoing projects. Women are working in its departments of engineering, design and administration. While just 10 percent of the engineers employed are women, Nilufar Langar from the ministry insists the number has increased over the past few years. She says 27 female engineers are working on the Darulaman Palace reconstruction project. The palace was heavily shelled in the civil war years of fighting between rival mujahedin factions for the control of Kabul. According to Langar, the women were recruited by the ministry on the basis of their professionalism and experience, and not for their gender.
Women engineers are restricted to working in secure parts of the country. Akbar Rustami, spokesperson for the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development, says most projects are in villages and female engineers cannot be sent there. “There are many cultural, security and social problems in Afghanistan so that is the reason that women cannot work in remote areas,” he says.
Women enroll for engineering in both Kabul University and the Kabul Polytechnic.
Corruption allegations
SACC’s Engineer Hamrah blames “administrative corruption” for her company’s inability to get new projects. Her company was fined 80,000 Afs (1,200 USD) for “a small mistake”, she says. She was made to run around for one year for the release of funds because she had refused to pay a bribe to staff in the Ministry of Urban Development and Housing, she adds. “This is the reason why I have not got a project for the last three years though our company has bid for work,” she says. “All projects are sold (for a price) – the men have links with the expatriates and ways to ensure they win projects,” she alleges.
According to Hamrah, another stage at which bribes have to be paid is to get a completion certificate. “When we ask them to certify our work is complete, they question the quality of the work and say, ‘Pay 500 USD (bribe money), and we will clear the project’. They ask for money at all stages,” she says. “I am so disheartened (by the situation).”
According to Engineer Hamrah, construction businesses like hers that are headed by women have no choice but to shut because of such problems.
While female engineers complain that work has come to a standstill, the Ministry of Commerce insists the role of women has increased, and so have the facilities extended by the government. Women have established between 500 and 700 construction and commercial companies in Afghanistan.
Musafer Quqandi, the ministry’s spokesperson, says the figures that the ministry collects is not gender-disaggregated but the ministry has speeded up the process for construction companies including ensuring he permits and licences are now issued “within hours”. He says women have the opportunity to avail also of special training for project writing and submission.
Declining numbers
Engineer Zakia Wardak, head of the Afghan Women Engineers Union, is less optimistic. She points to union membership which she says was 90 in 2013 and now down to 35. If a woman engineer gets a project, it will be small, according to her. “The size of the project is so small that there is no chance of making a profit,” she says. Wardak is herself the owner of a construction company set up in 2011, but it has always run up losses, she says.
Women-headed companies have additional overheads, she explains. “As a businesswoman I have to have a project manager, field manager, quality control officer and other subordinate since as a woman I cannot visit the project sites. It is the reason why female engineers lose out – they have financial problems, and find it difficult to deal with corruption, and added to that is gender discrimination,” Wardak says. Her company undertook three projects for US forces in Afghanistan, and in the process suffered financial losses worth 50,000 USD because, she says, she was not able to monitor the work herself and had to depend on others. “There were problems regarding quality, and hence the loss,” she says.
The Afghan Women Engineers Union was established to provide short term work experience for women graduates, and opportunities to go abroad for further training. “Some” women engineers have been able to avail of the opportunity, says Wardak. She mentions that the union met Rola Ghani, the first lady and active champion of women’s equality, last year to “seek a specified budget for businesswomen”. For sure, professional Afghan women are not giving up.
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