Afghans left out of their own rebuilding

Along a construction detour for the new highway between Kabul and Jalalabad, four unemployed Afghans stare out as trucks struggle up a dusty hill. The men are angry that the two Chinese firms in charge of the paving project haven't employed them or many of their compatriots.

"The Chinese are not hiring, and there are other organizations building schools, and they do not hire us, either," says one, Gula Jan.

After years of depending on the international community for help, Afghans are frustrated that they are not more involved in the rebuilding of their own country.

Yet road projects like this one underline a critical dilemma: Most Afghans still lack the skills needed to take over this work, even as the government begins modest efforts to try to train engineers. The short-term need to provide tangible improvements like a newly paved road often trumps the long-term work of training workers within Afghan ministries and the private sector.

"Do you do something very quickly in the absence of capacity so that you get some demonstrable results, or do you take the slow road and face a real danger of a reversion to conflict?" asks Ameerah Haq with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, arguing that development work cannot be kept on hold for training. "People in rural areas will say, 'My life is no better. Nothing has happened for me.' "

Yet the reliance on foreign skilled labor has not gone unnoticed by ordinary Afghans, many of whom resent the economic disparities in Kabul. The streets of the capital are packed with Land Cruisers taking foreigners to modern offices with high-speed Internet hookups. Foreigners risking their lives to come here also require higher salaries and more security, all of which drives up costs for redevelopment work.

In a dilapidated Soviet-era building, W.M. Rasooli, deputy minister for public works, says that most foreign road builders charge $250,000 to $500,000 per mile, but his ministry could build roads for less than half that price. Currently, only 23 percent of Afghanistan's budget for development actually goes through the government treasury; the remainder flows entirely outside.

"We have 60 to 70 percent capability to do this work ourselves. The remaining 30 percent is language and computer skills, because all the documentation must be done electronically in English," says Mr. Rasooli.

He argues that contracts should go directly to his office, which would allow the 60 engineers in his department to learn new standards, as well as provide higher salaries needed to woo better Afghan engineers away from other work. As it is, he says, "Engineers come and tell me that it is better to go work in the bazaar."

A new reform law aims in part to rectify this by preventing nonprofit nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) from bidding for construction contracts in Afghanistan.

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