Eight-year-old Mohammed Imran thinks Jaweed, the local shopkeeper in Khushgunbad eastern Afghan village is "cool" because his shop is full of sweets. "Uncle shopkeeper is a cool man - he has got lots of candies," Mohammed told AFP as he hung around outside the store. But it wasn't long ago that local children were scared of Jaweed and people insulted the 28-year-old for being a gun-toting militiamen - one of around 60,000 fighters loyal to local warlords and commanders across Afghanistan.
Jaweed is one of almost 25,000 fighters who have laid down their weapons as part of a UN-backed Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration program which was launched in Afghanistan last May and is almost at the halfway point.
After more than two decades of war, the country is awash with weapons and privately disarmament staff think there may be as many as five guns per militiaman, most of whom owe allegiance to local commanders.
But while only 25,000 guns have been collected, officials from the program hope that if they can break the link between local commanders and their poorly-paid fighters and offer people an alternative livelihood, many like Jaweed would jump at the chance.
"I'm happy with my new life - very, very happy," he said at his booth-like shop in Khushgunbad village some 15 kilometers (9 miles) north-east of Jalalabad, the capital of eastern Nangarhar province.
The ex-fighters are given the choice of working in agriculture, training for the police force, national army or de-mining, or setting up a small business like the shopkeeper, who said was sick of toting a gun for a living.
"I was tired of weapons, I wanted something different so I decided to become a shopkeeper," said the ethnic Pashtun, who has fought to feed his family for more than a decade.
Jaweed said he did not bear arms for a cause but simply to keep a roof over his head in his poverty-stricken village, switching sides to join whichever commander held sway over the area at the time.
First he fought for Mohammad Zaman, a regional mujahedin leader, then for the fundamentalist Taleban who ruled Afghanistan between 1996-2001, and finally he joined the forces of Hazrat Ali, another regional warlord who decided to disarm just over a month ago.
"I had no cause to fight for. I took the gun because they were paying me. I was hungry and I needed to feed my family," says the father of five children.
Former fighters receive an initial 250 dollars to start a business and a further 450 dollars to invest in the business a month and a half later, according to the UN scheme's officer for Nangahar province, Homayoun Wafa.
Another ex-militiaman, 40-year-old Wahidullah, from Laghman province, told AFP: "I was sick of having a gun on my shoulder, it gave me nothing."
"I carried a gun for 22 years, I fought the Russians, I think now it is time for work, not for fighting," he said as he came to the disarmament program office to collect his second cash package.
Afghanistan's disarmament drive only picked up speed ahead of the country's October 9 election, so it is too early to say whether demobilised militiamen might later revert to being soldiers working under local commanders.
Disarmament officials are working on incentives to offer alternative jobs, overseas travel and other sweeteners to local commanders, 80 percent of whom are illiterate and struggle to be re-integrated into civilian life.
The program is a priority for President Hamid Karzai, who won Afghanistan's presidential election having pledged to break the control of warlords and militia commanders who have mocked the central government's attempts to extend its authority into the provinces.
Disarmament staff admit that military strongmen like Hazrat Ali, who has maintained his private militia in Jalalabad even though he was appointed as police chief, are reluctant to cede power.
"The powerful warlords are resisting the program despite the fact that many ordinary militiamen are happy to be disarmed, because they fear that they will lose their power," said one official.
A US-led scheme is also underway to build a multi-ethnic national army recruited from ordinary citizens, including volunteers from among the former militiamen.
Comments
Comments are closed.