BBC Media Action Feed

How media is helping during Afghanistan’s hunger crisis

2023-03-21T12:06:23+00:00

A market in Afghanistan. Photo courtesy of Getty.

Our head of communications, Carolynne Wheeler, caught up with our Afghanistan project manager, Mursal Abrar, and our Afghanistan research manager, Mahdi Zaki, to learn about our project focused on nutrition with the World Food Programme.

Carolynne: Mahdi, Mursal – thank you for joining me! Please can you tell me about what we have been doing with the World Food Programme to address the current crisis in Afghanistan?

Mursal: Our World Food Programme (WFP) funded project began because Afghanistan is in a major crisis related to food security. According to recent WFP data, 19.9 million people in Afghanistan face acute food insecurity and 6 million Afghans face emergency-level food insecurity. The concept of our project was to help build the resilience of people in this crisis – to help them to cope and to improve their diet and nutrition with what limited resources they have. We wanted to create programming that would discuss symptoms of malnutrition, and to look at how to help women eat nutritious foods during pregnancy.

We also wanted to tackle the taboos that exist around certain foods in Afghanistan. Our culture is very focused on the importance of meat and bread. Lentils, for instance, are seen as food only for the poorest people, although they are very nutritious. Vegetables are widely available but also not seen as important.

We had a lot of discussion around affordable, healthy eating, and celebrating different foods – including plants, protein and dairy - that are still widely available in Afghanistan.

Carolynne: One of the questions you had to address at the start of this project is, how can media and communication help when you have so many millions of people who are food insecure. How did you handle this?

Mahdi: Before the start of the project, we had this discussion among ourselves, especially the research team. At the time, we were saying that over 22 million people were in need of food assistance, and in the last year it has increased to 28 million. So we had this tough moral discussion. We were spending money to produce media outputs; shouldn’t this money be used to help people buy bread to feed their children?

We began with research, to find out how media could help. We did a nationally representative survey for this project, speaking with over 3,000 people around the country – men and women. Around 40% of the interviews were face-to-face because more than 40% of people in Afghanistan do not have access to mobile phones.

We also did some qualitative interviews with women, IDPs (internally displaced people), Kuchi nomadic people and people with disabilities. And we asked questions including what is their usual diet, who makes decisions about what to eat for meals, who purchases food, what information sources could they access, and what information do they have about nutrition and nutritious food?

We found two types of families – those who were really struggling to feed themselves, and those who had some food, but did not know how they could make nutritious meals.

We also learned that doctors are major influencers when it comes to health and nutrition, and that people trusted radio and TV most.

Carolynne: You have said that in Afghanistan, when people think about their daily meal, most people think first of bread, then of red meat and rice. How did you tackle these traditional beliefs in your programmes?

Mahdi: Red meat is considered as the highest standard. When you invite people to your house you have to cook meat and rice. That would be considered a proper meal. Vegetables are never welcomed! Traditionally we cook with a lot of oil.

We had to look at who is cooking – usually women - and who is buying in the market – which can be women or men. The programme encouraged audiences to discuss what they have to prepare, to make a meal plan for what they want to cook. We discussed the importance of nutrition for children, pregnant and breastfeeding women, and older people, to maintain their strength.

We also looked at how people were spending money on food. In Afghanistan, people traditionally eat a lot of bread. So the programme looked at how people could go to the market and, instead of buying 10 loaves of bread for 100 Afghanis, they could buy five loaves of bread and spend the rest of the money on potatoes and other vegetables. In this way, they could diversify their diet and consume a more nutritious meal.

Carolynne: Now that the programming has been on air, what have you learned about its impact?

Mursal: We have done an evaluation and we have heard some feedback from communities who are very marginalised that this weekly radio programme really helped them. They said that they understand they can prepare a healthy and nutritious meal with different foods, even with a limited income. Previously, they understood they could only have bread. We also shared information about how to access humanitarian aid and food distribution.

Mahdi: The most satisfactory finding is when we found that the information provided by our radio programme was helpful to people. It had provided them with a perspective that they could diversify their meal, instead of just eating bread. The programme provided them with the information that vegetables could be very nutritious. It helped people who are very poor, earning maybe just 100 or 200 Afghanis a day. In the past, that person might think we can only buy some loaves of bread, and it has changed their perspective of what they can have for a meal.

Mursal: This finding was very touching for us, and it was the highlight of the programme, because we really wanted to build the resiliency of people in this crisis.

Madhi: Here is what some of our listeners said about our work:

“In the past, we used to buy a large flour bags and consume within two weeks. After we listened to [the radio programme], now we consume the same bag in one month. I have started work with livestock. I have learnt about these after listening to this programme and I want this programme to continue.”

- A 50-year man living in an IDP camp in Herat province

“I am pregnant and the programme has helped me a lot. After listening to this programme, I have started consuming vegetables and diversified my diet. Vegetables are cheap and we can make nutritious food, and also they are very useful for women who breastfeed their child and pregnant women like me. And the programme also talked about beans which are also very important to us.”

- A 28-year woman living in an IDP camp in Herat province

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Our media and communication for development project with the World Food Programme ran from July 2022 to February 2023, and included a radio magazine-style programme, Destarkhan (Dinner Table), with community members and nutrition experts discussing nutrition and food security; a radio drama with messages on nutrition; and public service announcements on how to access food assistance from aid agencies. To learn more about our work in Afghanistan, please see our website.

'It was as if the moon had landed on the Earth' - working through turmoil in Afghanistan

2021-12-16T12:33:14+00:00

Shoaib Sharifi is BBC Media Action’s country director in Afghanistan and this year’s BBC News Leader of the Year. He writes about how the team are responding to an increasingly grave humanitarian crisis.

On the morning of 15 August, I stood in front of my closet and chose one of my sharpest Western-style suits to wear to the office. To this day, I cannot explain why – except that nothing suggested that this day would be very different from the day before.

In the office, the workday began as usual, with preparation for a training session with humanitarian aid workers. But by 11 o’clock that morning, we heard the news that the Taliban had entered Kabul.

We could not believe it – it felt as though someone had told us the moon had landed on the Earth. It will take another year for us to digest these events.

What happens next?

My immediate concern was for the welfare of our team, particularly our female colleagues. Hours-long traffic jams in the streets made it difficult to ensure people’s safe return home; many resorted to walking, in small groups for additional security. Full of regret for having chosen this suit, which prevented me from blending in, I waited until nightfall for my own departure. There had been numerous targeted killings each day in Kabul before the Taliban’s takeover, with many journalists among them.

The next day we asked ourselves: what happens next? And we realised we were not prepared to stop working.

Shoaib Sharifi interviewing a doctor as part of our magazine-style health programme for radio. Credit: BBC Media Action

The safety and welfare of colleagues was the first priority. But the other priority was our audiences. Many radio stations stopped broadcasting, out of fear, and we knew our audiences needed us more than ever.

No one was asked to come into work – but some did, at great risk, while others worked from home. In this difficult and dangerous situation, we have tried to focus on audience needs. Within the first few weeks, 2,000 health centres, including major hospitals, were closed down across the country.

We had been producing a radio health programme twice per month, focused on COVID-19 and broadcast on BBC Afghan service and on 30 community radio stations, reaching up to 12 million people. Now, people were without meaningful public health services, so we increased our programme frequency to twice per week – once in Dari and once in Pashto. We enlisted doctors to help us in a new programme segment, Where There Is No Doctor – covering topics like how to nurse patients at home.

Skyrocketing mental health needs

All of BBC Media Action’s work is based on audience research. In September, we were able to carry out research, mainly by mobile phone, to assess our audiences’ needs for health information. What came back was startling: 62% of respondents identified a need for mental health support. Stress, anxiety and depression had skyrocketed.

We created a question-and-answer segment for our radio programme, and asked our audience to send in voice messages with their questions and experiences, to be addressed with a counsellor on the next show. We were overwhelmed with hundreds of calls, from both men and women.

Amid all the hardship and risk, we have had this incredible feeling of being able to respond in an emergency with information that really matters. People are without incomes, without healthcare and without the information they need to make informed decisions. Where do they turn? In a crisis, radio is still the most important source of media for Afghans.

Shoaib Sharifi during a break from Lifeline training with local journalists in Kandahar. Credit: BBC Media Action

We realised that we could reach more people if we used our Lifeline programming to train more community journalists to report effectively in a crisis. We worked around the clock to adapt training materials into Dari and Pashto - a month’s worth of translating, editing and subtitling in one week. We weren’t even sure anyone would turn up. But in our first session we were amazed to see 25 participants, including six women. We have further built these connections through WhatsApp groups: answering questions, helping with story ideas and interview questions, and assessing listener needs.

We have also carried on working with the humanitarian response community, conducting research and sharing our findings to help aid agencies respond to people’s needs more effectively.

Proud to serve our audiences

The last days and weeks have been a blur of constant work and worry. The humanitarian emergency is only deepening in Afghanistan, while security continues to be a grave concern. Some of us have elected to remain behind; we are also exploring a model where we work alongside some of our colleagues who have been evacuated from Afghanistan to the UK.

We don’t know what the future holds, but we are proud to be serving our audiences with the trusted information they so desperately need, and to help make the emergency response in Afghanistan as effective as it can be.

Learn more about BBC Media Action’s work in Afghanistan or donate to our work through JustGiving (leads to a third-party site).

Media for equality in Afghanistan: from the frontlines

2021-07-01T12:51:20+00:00

As the Generation Equality Forum Paris examines issues of gender equality, including in media, Mehr Mursal Amiri shares her experience and her reflections as an Afghan journalist.

I started my media career in 2018. It began almost by accident. I went with my friend to support her for a screen test and the producer asked if I would be interested, and would I like a screen test too? I decided to try it. A few days later I received a call to join Ariana television.

When I first started, my family didn’t support the idea. Working in media is not a traditionally accepted career for women in Afghanistan. Many parents and families still don’t like to see their daughters and sisters in the media.

But things are changing now. After seeing the impact of my work today, my family supports me, and they are proud of me. I am encouraged that my younger sister says she wants to follow my path.

The risks involved

But there are still great cultural obstacles for women in every field in Afghanistan. And in media it’s even harder. The reason might be that in media, they are too visible. A media job requires you to have a presence on social media and deal with the public, where you will be labelled, harassed and trolled.

Personal security is a big risk for Afghan women working in media. But I am proud to say that I have resisted these threats and have not given up, because I know that by doing my job, I am doing my part to inspire our young generation and helping to change the life of Afghanistan’s people by providing them information, educating and entertaining them.

When I started working for media, the gender gap was so great. I believed that gender equality didn’t mean anything. This was true for all media outlets in Afghanistan. Even today, we hardly have content that is about and for women.

The national broadcaster Radio Television Afghanistan is working hard to change this. Just two years ago, only 8 per cent of RTA’s staff were female. That included cleaners and behind-the-scenes staff. That number has increased dramatically now and, most importantly, it now has over 60% female representation on screen and in our programmes.

Shifting the balance

RTA staff now take a course about respect, to create awareness about gender equality and stereotypes. And they are working to start an Academy to train more female journalists and make them ready for leadership roles. The idea is to have equality in every single department and leadership role in RTA.

Media in Afghanistan have come a long way in 20 years, just like women’s rights and opportunities have. There are more young women like me who are educated, well-spoken, and contributing to society. We can see more female journalists around the country now, telling stories that matter to women.

BBC Media Action is also part of this - they work with female journalists around the country, and with RTA on the programme Open Jirga which includes a female presenter and women’s views on the peace process, government and other current issues.

But there still aren’t enough training or opportunities for women in media. We need more support and more opportunities to talk about women’s issues, and understanding of how issues are relevant to women. We face great challenges still in how we can reach more women in remote and rural areas.

And amid daily violence and fragile peace talks, we need support to maintain this progress.

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Mehr Mursal Amiri was previously based in Kabul.

Handing the microphone to Afghan women

2021-03-10T16:00:04+00:00

Four Afghan women were killed in as many days in March 2021 – targeted for being women working in television and in medicine. As Afghanistan’s peace process is marked by increasing violence, we held remarkable sessions of our Open Jirga and WhatMatters2U programmes, giving women from the farthest corners of the country a voice.

The only thing more worrying than COVID-19 in Afghanistan now is the threat of bombings and violence. More than a year after the Taliban signed a deal with the United States, a wave of assassinations continues, targeting journalists, judges and activists in drive-by shootings or ‘sticky bombs’ on vehicles.

Yet, when COVID-19 travel restrictions began to lift, we knew this was our opportunity to get outside of Kabul. We wanted to give people outside the capital the chance to share their views on the peace process in our debate and discussion programmes.

For months, we had been using mobile phones and video calls to give people a platform to discuss the peace process. We wanted to do it in person – and most importantly, we wanted to focus on women, so often excluded from public discussion and left virtually invisible in Afghanistan.

Shazia Haya opens the WhatMatters2U discussion in Herat. Credit: BBC Media Action Afghanistan

To the heart of the Silk Road

We started with a trip to Afghanistan’s third-largest city, Herat, in the west, 700 kilometres from Kabul. This city was at the heart of the ancient Silk Road and it is breath-taking, famous for its ancient sites, its arts and culture.

On our journey we passed four minarets commissioned 700 years ago by the powerful Mughul queen Gawhardshad Begum, which have survived decades of bombings by Soviet and then American forces. To me, they signify elegance and strength – much like the young women we were about to meet for our programmes, Open Jirga, and our new online show, WhatMatters2U, focused on young people.

In Herat, I found myself moderating a discussion among 30 young women, including small business owners, software designers, engineers, and a group of girls who are Afghanistan’s first and only girls’ robotics team.

Women at a special session of WhatMatters2U, our online discussion platform, in Herat. Credit: BBC Media Action Afghanistan

A new generation of women

These young women represent a new generation. They have overcome deeply entrenched patriarchal culture and traditions to get an education, and to achieve in fields that are not traditional for women in even more equal societies. The fame of the girls’ robotics team has travelled far beyond the boundaries of this conservative province and even outside of Afghanistan itself.

In my work I have heard so many stories of women abused and deprived of their most basic rights – to education, to proper health care, to grow up before being married and bearing children. Herat remains deeply conservative, with some of the highest reported rates of violence against women in the country. Domestic abuse is so pervasive that the town’s main hospital even has a dedicated ward for female survivors of self-immolation – linked to severe abuse and extreme domestic violence.

And yet here stood these young women, with a line-up of high-tech devices – their creations - on display. Sumaya, the captain of the robotics’ team, proudly shared with our group a medical device first created from old car parts. “This is an alternative machine to a ventilator. We invented this to save lives during this pandemic,” she said.

The ventilator built by the girls' robotics' team is shown at a special discussion session of WhatMatters2U. Credit: BBC Media Action Afghanistan

'Against the dominant beliefs of society'

But Sumaya and her team also spoke of the many hurdles that block progress for Afghan women – a feeling echoed by many of the comments during the show. We broadcast this episode as a Facebook Live which drew a quarter of a million viewers, who joined our studio audience in asking questions of these remarkable women. How might women in other parts of the country learn these skills, when so many do not have access to education? Why can women not have support to achieve in technology?

‘What we make is against the dominant beliefs in our society. Making hardware and software is not perceived as a woman’s expertise,” said one of our participants, a software designer. Despite her achievements, she too has felt limited by cultural restrictions and constant threat of violence, and said she is virtually stuck in this corner of Afghanistan. “I couldn’t go to Kabul to receive an award for one of our products, due to safety concerns and family restrictions,” she said.

The mothers of these young women also joined the show, and I asked them what it has taken to realise their daughters’ dreams. The mother of one of the young women on the robotics team described the pain and worry she feels over her daughter’s achievements.

“When my daughter steps out of the house, and until she returns, my heart is pounding, worrying about her safety. But most painful is [knowing] the negative beliefs of society, towards girls going out of home and doing what is seen as taboo,” she said. “I have said to save the future of this country, we have to pay the price and go through endless hardship.”

The city without women

With her words in my ears, our next stop was Kandahar, 300 kilometres to the south and Afghanistan’s second-largest city. It was my first trip here and when we arrived, I thought of it as ‘the city without women’, as there were no women to be seen on the streets - women are expected to remain at home, out of sight.

Shazia Haya opens Open Jirga in Kandahar. Credit: BBC Media Action Afghanistan.

This is the heartland of the Taliban, which forbids girls’ education and progress, and still controls some of its districts.

In this conservative setting, we had decided to do something unprecedented: an all-women show, inviting 50 women to ask questions of a panel that included Afghanistan’s Minister of the Economy, one of few women in Cabinet.

We expected many to refuse. Many had journeys to the studio that took them directly through areas of conflict. Yet 47 of the 50 invited women turned up. Despite the hardship and the risk, these women wanted to be heard.

The best Women's Day gift - equality

In all of our sessions, we had to take security precautions – both against COVID-19, and against the threat of violence. To protect against the virus, we held our sessions outdoors, ensured everyone washed their hands and wore masks, and ensured physical distance between guests. And to help protect these women against repercussions for participating, we invited them to keep their faces covered if they wished, and ensured none of our participants were named.

Yet few were discouraged from speaking. The best Women’s Day gift, one said, would be if her family and her society would respect her and treat her as an equal human being. Another wanted to study what she was interested in – journalism and broadcasting – instead of Islamic studies, as her family insisted.

A woman from Kandahar cries as she relays her difficult journey to a special Open Jirga session. Credit: BBC Media Action Afghanistan

But the one whose voice will remain with me was a 40-something mother who arrived a few minutes late. She was among the first to raise her hand to speak – but when she did, she broke down in tears. Her journey to make herself heard, she said, had almost cost her her life, as she had found herself caught in an armed battle between the Taliban and government forces.

'We deserve a normal life'

“There is fighting in our district every day,” she said. “We are exhausted and shattered by bullets and bombs.”

After the show, I pulled her aside. Why had she gone through such danger to attend our show? She told me simply that she wanted our panel, and the world, to know that Afghanistan women needed to breathe. They deserve a normal life.

Open Jirga is BBC Media Action’s long-running debate and discussion programme covering issues of national importance for Afghans. WhatMatters2U is a social media-led debate and discussion programme aimed at young audiences, particularly women and girls. Both are funded by the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

Handwashing with soap for health - our work in Afghanistan during COVID-19

2020-10-14T12:24:11+00:00

Nomadic people on a road north of Kabul.

In the spring of 2018, I paid a visit to a remote village of Afghanistan. As part of the villagers’ hospitality, I was served a warm cup of green tea along with some homemade cookies, and at first I was captivated by people’s stories about their culture and traditions.

Then, someone placed a large steel kettle, known in Afghanistan as a samovar, onto the fire to brew more tea. I was distracted by its NGO logo. Where did they get this samovar?

With a slight smirk, the villagers replied: “This was donated to us by an NGO for handwashing. We converted it into a samovar.”

My initial reaction was to contain my laughter at their cleverness, converting a portable sink into a samovar. But then my laughter turned into sadness at the outcome of the NGO’s efforts. They had spent so much money and effort, and in the end, their resources were not used as intended. They had not had the lasting impact they had hoped for.

I have been a humanitarian worker for the past eight years, leading various projects in providing basic water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services and working on hygiene behaviour change in Afghanistan. What I have personally observed over the years is that, despite the prolonged presence of international humanitarian organisations, many have struggled to achieve the goal of sustained hygiene behaviour change.

This is because many WASH projects focus on providing services, rather than focusing on behaviour change from the very start. They may also focus on the idea of access to water, sanitation and hygiene as being the main outcome of their work, rather than a path to other benefits.

Awareness campaigns need to explain the health benefits, and promote these ideas in a way that results in people changing how and when they wash their hands. They will not work if they impose theories that do not consider the context, or the importance of hygiene in Afghan culture, religion or tradition at the most local level.

Afghan actor Mamnoon Maqsoodi voices a handwashing PSA in our Kabul studio.

What I have observed over the years of working on hygiene behaviour change projects is that to obtain long-term impact, you must:

Make sure behaviour change is at the forefront of the project, alongside service provision
Ensure hygiene awareness campaigns and approaches are rooted in local culture, traditions, religion and norms, with the intent of changing behaviour
Give local humanitarian organisations and civil societies the autonomy to develop context-based behaviour change approaches independently, based on their knowledge on the ground
Remember that when thinking about access to services, it may mean influencing local government agencies to change policies to meet local needs, or reconsidering an agency approach and adapting to what partners find works best locally
Use the power of media as an effective platform to contribute towards sustainable impact on hygiene behaviour change.

I am now working with BBC Media Action to begin implementing a Hygiene Behaviour Change Coalition project, funded by UK Aid and Unilever, focused on changing hygiene behaviours, including encouraging handwashing with soap, to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

The project targets two high-risk and under-served groups in Afghanistan, the urban poor and the nomadic Kuchi people. We will reach these audiences through radio and television public service announcements, and ‘fast fiction’ format storytelling rooted in local culture and tradition.

To start off this work, we have cast Mamnoon Maqsoodi, one of Afghanistan’s most famous cinema and theatre artists, to voice the first round of our TV and radio PSA campaigns. His famous voice is known to nearly all Afghan people.

We know that the majority of advertisements and PSAs use formal language and an official tone to convey their messages. We have taken a different approach, using colloquial language and a more informal tone that will resonate with our audiences.

To build our PSAs, we have undertaken a full behaviour change approach. This includes formative research, multiple workshops including the development of a theory of change, and multiple pre-tests of our content to ensure it will be effective as communication for behaviour change.

Afghan actor Mamnoon Maqsoodi washes his hands during our studio recording.

So enthusiastic was Mr Maqsoodi in embracing his character that he insisted on bringing a portable sink into the recording studio, to capture the realistic sounds and feeling of handwashing as he explained how to wash hands with soap to help fight the virus.

“This is so refreshing, to convey a message in this manner, which any Afghan will understand,” he said.

BBC Media Action will work in Afghanistan and Somalia with the Hygiene Behaviour Change Coalition until July 2021. Our aim is to focus on hygiene behaviour change that will support people to better protect themselves against COVID-19, and contribute to better health for themselves and their families. Some 80,000 children under five die each year in Afghanistan – and an estimated 12% of those are from diarrhoeal diseases, which can often be prevented with good hygiene including handwashing with soap.

It is my hope that this campaign, deeply rooted in local culture and tradition, will be the start of longer-term change in hygiene practice, and better health for some of Afghanistan’s most vulnerable people.

Broadcasting from the basement: supporting Afghan audiences during COVID-19

2020-05-19T12:26:02+00:00

Accurate and trusted information is critical to coping with the COVID-19 pandemic – especially when communities are already facing insecurity, as in Afghanistan. Find out how our flagship national TV discussion programme, Open Jirga, has adapted to life under lockdown to continue supporting audiences across the country to cope.

“How can families deal with the mental health effects related to quarantine?”

“We live in a Taliban controlled area, how can we access coronavirus testing services?”

“How can we hold a funeral for a loved one who has died from the virus?”

These are just some of the questions raised over the past few weeks during special COVID-19 broadcasts of our longstanding discussion show, Open Jirga.

Meaning ‘Open Assembly’ in Dari and Pashto – the main languages in Afghanistan – the show reaches over 6 million people across the country and is renowned for bringing citizens face-to-face with their leaders for inclusive and constructive debate. In previous episodes, audiences have raised important issues such as peace talks with the Taliban, disability rights and gender equality, including in debates with the current and former presidents.

The show’s success has always rested on its live studio audience, its ‘assembly’ of normal people who ask about issues that matter to them. But under lockdown, this is simply out of the question.

Last month, our production team set about adapting Open Jirga’s format to ensure the safety of our production crew and panellists, without compromising on the show’s ability to engage audiences and support them to hold their leaders to account.

Over two days, our team rapidly transformed the communal area in the basement of our Kabul office into a makeshift TV studio. We replaced the live audience with virtual question-gathering via video link, reduced the number of panellists from four to two, and followed safe distancing measures on set.

The first COVID-19 special, aired on 13 April, focussed on living with lockdown. Many people in rural areas aren’t observing the rules, in part due to conflicting messaging about physical distancing from health officials and religious leaders. So Open Jirga welcomed a top Islamic scholar and a senior health official to gather around an aftaba lagan, a traditional Afghan handwashing pot, to address people’s specific concerns and set the record straight with cohesive, trusted information.

Watch a clip from a recent Open Jirga broadcast on COVID-19

Since then we’ve covered practical topics, such as how and when to use facemasks, as well as discussed public access to health services for communities living in conflict zones or areas controlled by the Taliban. And, crucially, we’ve busted some of the new myths and rumours about COVID-19 emerging every day – for instance that drinking black tea, shaving your head or wearing henna can ‘cure’ the virus. We’ve also aimed to dispel the widely-held belief that the virus is mostly killing non-Muslims, which has led to complacency within some communities.

At BBC Media Action we also know from experience that media can help audiences feel more hopeful as they connect with others and hear them echo their questions, feelings and worries.

This is so important as there is also much fear and mistrust of health systems here in Afghanistan, and stigma towards people who have, or might have, COVID-19. As one virtual questioner puts it:

“People in our area do not want to opt for medical support fearing that if people learn they have COVID-19 they may be discriminated against or stigmatised by others as ‘coronavirus-affected people’.”

Enabling people to share and discuss their worries helps to break down this stigma and foster understanding, and by welcoming trusted figures on our basement broadcasts, we’re opening up important issues in a positive way – rather than leaving them to sow further division in society.

It’s strange not having our audience members with us in person, but there’s no doubt that they – and our millions of viewers across the country – are with us from a distance, in our new ‘virtual assembly’.

And while we hope for some form of normality to resume soon, even under lockdown the show must go on.

Shoaib Sharifi is Country Director for BBC Media Action Afghanistan.

Open Jirga is broadcast on BBC World Service Dari and Pashto Radio, as well as the state broadcaster Radio Television Afghanistan. It is also aired on Salam Watandar, a network of 101 FM stations across the country.

This work is currently funded by the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

“I will be there even if my bodyguards refuse to accompany me.”

2016-10-03T09:56:54+00:00

Members of the Open Jirga audience during a recording

Scores of people were killed or injured early last month when twin bomb blasts hit Kabul and armed assailants attacked the buildings housing an international charity.

We were due to record an episode of our discussion show Open Jirga the next day on the theme of ‘empowered women, prosperous Afghanistan’. Given the uncertainty of the security situation, our producers worried whether anyone would attend. The chances of the recording going ahead seemed slim.

Staff, whose day started at 5am, faced huge logistical challenges. They needed to ferry members of the studio audience, who were staying in a hotel, safely through the city to Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA) - the country’s national broadcaster. Kabul’s roads were completely blocked by a tight security cordon. Fighting was still going on and security forces had cordoned off large areas of the city.

Two members of the team decided to set out on foot, guiding a small group through back streets to the studio. It took them about an hour to negotiate their way through various check-points. A second group took another route and by 9am most of the crew and audience had arrived safely.

The presenter of Open Jirga, Daud Junbish, had abandoned his car after an hour of trying to get through the gridlocked traffic. On the way, he spent a good degree of time planning for a number of different scenarios: what if there’s only a small audience? What if all or some of the panellists can’t make it? His thoughts were constantly interrupted by the sound of gunfire from the area near the charity whose offices were the site of the attack. He made it to RTA soon after 9am and went into planning mode with those who had already arrived.

Daud Junbish facilitates an all female panel for Open Jirga

No matter what

Soon after this, the producer of Open Jirga, hesitantly picked up the phone to check if members of the all-female panel would brave the perilous journey. Delbar Nazari, Minister of Women’s Affairs, gave an energetic and encouraging response, saying: “I will be there even if my bodyguards refuse to accompany me”

She was as good as her word – arriving an hour before the show was due to start and chatting to female members of the audience. Nasrin Oryakhil, Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, did the same and arrived way ahead of schedule. At this stage, getting a full panel looked closer to reality. The two other panellists, Hasina Safi (Director of the Afghan Women’s Network) and Sima Joyinda (former governor of the Ghor province in Western Afghanistan) arrived shortly after.

Disbar Nazari with a member of the audience ahead of recording

Equality between men and women

Incredibly, despite ongoing fighting in the centre of Kabul, the recording started five minutes ahead of schedule. The opening credits rolled and a woman stood up in front of a full audience to ask the first question: “'Why, after so much effort, are women in Afghanistan still not equal to men?"

The emotions among the team members at this moment cannot be described. What had seemed impossible was made possible thanks to the sheer determination, dedication and commitment of the Open Jirga team, the audience and the panel. The experience made us more hopeful about the future of Afghanistan. It showed that, despite the security challenges, men and women are more than willing to demonstrate exceptional courage and commitment to be able to discuss issues of national importance on national TV.

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Skiing in Afghanistan

2016-06-07T13:17:33+00:00

Ilyas Tahiri, a presenter at Radio Bamyan, skiing in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan’s Bamyan province is best known for its ancient statues of Buddha, destroyed 15 years ago by the Taliban government. Today, its relative security and freezing winters are aiding the growth of a fledgling skiing industry. Mukhtar Yadgar explains how a radio station is helping local people discuss its potential for growth.

A five minute drive from the site where the ancient Buddhas of Bamyan once stood, a radio mast sprouts from the ground. It belongs to Radio Bamyan, a local radio station in one of Afghanistan’s most mountainous regions. It’s summer now and wisps of brown dust rise up with the heat, yet in the winter months, Radio Bamyan’s roof is covered with snow.

Radio Bamyan, Bamyan Province, Afghanistan

Bamyan’s frosty winter weather, steep slopes and relative security have popularised skiing in the province. However, there are no ski-lifts, no chalets and certainly no après-ski. In the absence of sporting infrastructure, it was recently announced that two skiers from Bamyan will be representing Afghanistan at the 2018 Pyeongchang‎ Winter Olympics in South Korea.

Bamyan is also the venue for the annual Afghan Ski Challenge – which counts ‘no weapons allowed’ amongst its rules. Yet despite these successes suggesting a potential new ski-tourism destination, most of the local population, a relatively poor community, has had little opportunity to discuss what the growth of the skiing industry would mean for them.

Over the past year, Radio Bamyan received BBC Media Action training to boost its editorial, business development and programme making skills. Training is part of a wider project to help Afghan media become more sustainable and independent – so that it can play an important role in helping people hold their leaders to account.

It was this ongoing support which inspired the station to produce a special show to discuss the government's plans for the sport and its potential economic and cultural benefits.

Members of the audience prepare for a debate on Bamyan's ski industry at Radio Bamyan

Crowded into a small studio, people passionate about the sport – including sportsmen and women, a politician and the director of the Bamyan Ski Federation – discussed the future of skiing in the region.

On the topic of female representation, Arifa Akbari, a female skier, told listeners that an “increasing number of women are now skiing in Bamyan’s ski parks.”

On the development of infrastructure, the Director of Bamyan’s Ski Federation, Afzal Noori announced that “six new ski parks were planned in Bamyan province” while local authorities were trying to organise direct flights from Dubai to Bamyan to facilitate ski-tourism. Soon “Bamyan will be Afghanistan’s skiing centre” he declared.

Later on in the discussion, another contributor suggested that future tournaments could have a “significantly positive impact on the small businesses of Bamyan” as visitors arrived.

Like everyone in that studio, I’m looking forward to seeing what skiing can do for Bamyan. It’s peaceful here, but the community is still poor. Attracting more visitors to its historic sites and a fledgling ski-industry – could have a major economic impact on the local community.

Participants of an international skiing tournament trek up a hill in Bamyan

The broadcast enabled communities to hear what the government has planned and helped raise awareness about the potential of the sport to bring business to the area.

I also hope this episode, along with an increase in ski-tourism and Bamyan’s Olympic hopefuls, will inspire a few more local residents to don their goggles, strap on their skis and take to the slopes this winter.

Open Jirga: national identity in Afghanistan

2015-11-24T08:48:32+00:00

When a TV debate show was filmed at the tomb of one of Afghanistan’s founding fathers it was clear how much a sense of ‘place’ is interlinked with ‘identity’. Shirazuddin Siddiqi reflects on an especially memorable Open Jirga.

Not even a mosquito flapped its wings, as Afghans would say to describe a completely empty place, in and around one of the most sacred sites in southern Afghanistan.

Open Jirga, a TV debate show for people in Afghanistan, had chosen the space – between two of Afghanistan’s most important historic sites – as a filming location to discuss ‘national identity’ with an audience of Afghans representing 21 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces.

The Khirqa-e Sharif (shrine of the cloak) is home to Prophet Mohammad’s cloak – which has only been taken out twice since it was put there for safekeeping in the 18th century. Next to the Khirqa lies the tomb of Ahmad Shah Abdali (later known as Ahmad Shah Durrani), founder of modern Afghanistan. Ahmad Shah was a young general in the army of the Persian Emperor, Nader Afshar. After the emperor was assassinated, he separated a large part of the empire and declared it an independent country, Afghanistan, in mid-18 century.

Usually one of the busiest places in Kandahar due to its cultural importance, the site had been sealed off for two days by Afghan security forces so we could film. The senior police officer charged with the responsibility of securing the site said he “couldn’t remember seeing the Khirqa so empty ever before.”

For logistical and security reasons, it was a lengthy and tricky process to secure the venue – but it was certainly worth it.

This external content is available at its source: Twitter: Daud Junbish

A strong debate

Locating filming at a site so engrained in Afghanistan’s culture had a powerful impact on both the panel and the audience and facilitated a strong debate on an issue which might have sounded more theoretical and abstract anywhere else.

People in the audience, young and old, female and male, educated or otherwise, enthusiastically engaged with the debate – on a subject brought to life by the luminous tomb of the founder of their country in the background.

“Look, I can’t speak if I sit, is it ok if I stand up?” asked an elderly man who had travelled over 450km to be in the audience.

“I’m so happy to be at the tomb of [Ahmad Shah]… every ethnic group, including the Hindus sitting [behind me] are sons of Afghanistan, this is our home and Afghanistan is ours” he said passionately.

Another audience member, talked about his indifference to tribal divisions, saying, “Turkman, Pashtun and Tajik are all from one nation... when we travel outside the country, we are all known as Afghans. No one calls us Tajik or Pashtun. We want to be called Afghan.”

This external content is available at its source: Open Jirga - Twitter Status

Is Afghanistan a united nation?

The central focus of the debate was simple:

‘Ahmad Shah Durrani laid the foundation of modern Afghanistan in 1747 but, nearly three centuries later, is Afghanistan a united nation?’

It’s an important question for Afghanistan. Although the country has made much progress over the past decade – it remains a fragile state divided on the lines of language, religion, ethnicity and tribe. By providing a platform for debate, Open Jirga provided a rare opportunity for dialogue on ‘identity’, in an environment which has become increasingly strained in the face of increased conflict and uncertainty.

This external content is available at its source: Open Jirga - Episode 56

The next morning, I happened to fly back to Kabul on the same plane as a number of audience members. They were from various ethnic, regional and linguistic backgrounds and had flown in to take part in the discussion as strangers.

Now, post-broadcast, amidst lively discussion and laughter as the debate continued, they looked like old friends.

The subject of national identity is a tricky subject in Afghanistan, but by addressing the topic, Open Jirga is providing an important role in encouraging unity between different groups of people through powerful, but peaceful discussion.

“If you can’t be a father, I beg you Mr President, be a stepfather!”

2015-11-02T16:19:21+00:00

Three years after its launch, Shirazuddin Siddiqi reflects on how Afghanistan's TV debate show Open Jirga continues to provide a voice to Afghans amid insecurity and increased uncertainty.

In October 2012, we launched Open Jirga, our TV show in Afghanistan, with big ambitions. We wanted to play a role, however small, in ensuring a smooth and successful journey for the Afghan people through tough and testing times. Right from its first episode, Open Jirga brought together people from across the country to question their leaders on critical topics such as security, corruption, the economy, religion and the role of women.

But the lengthy dispute over the election results in April 2014, which led to the establishment of the National Unity Government (NUG), set Afghanistan on an entirely different path from the one the nation had dreamed about. High expectations of the NUG were not met. Government processes became paralysed, security got worse and worse, the economy suffered, corruption continued and money began to drain from the country in record amounts.

An estimated 7,000 young, educated Afghans are now reportedly leaving the country every month. From midnight, the queue outside the passport office runs into the thousands as people line up before the doors open for business at 8am.

With critical military, political and governance challenges piling up in Afghanistan, we seem further away from our ambitions than we first were when we launched Open Jirga three years ago. This is not what success looks like.

Courage and clarity

Success, perhaps, lies elsewhere. It lies in transforming silent frustration into unmistakably powerful voices. Voices such as Haleema Hamidi’s, who works as a shepherd and lives in Baghlan province in northern Afghanistan, which has long suffered from violence and insecurity and where the Taliban has recently captured territory.

In a recent Open Jirga which focused on the impact of Afghans migrating, Haleema articulated her worries with extraordinary courage and clarity.

"I have a message for young Afghans, those who go abroad," she said. "Do they take their sisters, their mothers? No, they don’t. They shouldn’t go abroad, they shouldn’t flee. They should stay in their homeland, defend their homeland, defend their reputation and dignity. They should defend their sisters and mothers… Afghanistan is our homeland. No matter how much unrest there is, how much devastation there is, we defend our country. We have honour. We have dignity."

Despite coming from a conservative rural district, she sat in a mixed audience – which is a novelty in itself - flanked by men from other provinces who were complete strangers to her.

She confidently identified the problem as weak leadership. "The government has responsibility," she said. "The youth join the national army and the national police. They get besieged, they call the higher authorities to say we have been besieged, we don’t have provisions, we don't have equipment, we need help. No help is given to them. The President is the father of the nation, he [should act like] the father of the nation. For God's sake, if he can’t be a father, he should at least pay as much attention to the nation as a stepfather does… This is all I have to say."

She sat down to huge applause from a studio audience which was a true cross-section of Afghan society, with all ethnic, linguistic, religious and regional groups represented.

Online debate

Before this particular episode was broadcast on TV, Open Jirga's producer posted Haleema's powerful speech on Facebook. Breaking all the programme’s records online, it received over one thousand views per hour in the first three days. In the 72 hours after it was uploaded, it was viewed over 81,000 times, liked over 2,250 times, shared nearly 1,800 times and attracted 299 comments from all sides of the argument.

"What truly excellent logic," said one commenter praising Haleema’s eloquence. Another said, "Dear respected lady, those young people who have chosen to stay die of hunger" while another commenter also complained that, "those who educated themselves remain unemployed".

Such comments collectively reflect the ever increasing level of disaffection and disillusionment with the Afghan state. Such words need to be heard by national leaders and by the whole nation. They need a platform.

Haleema's clear message delivered in the simplest possible way struck a chord and led these and a lot of other people to express their frustration. The expression of frustration alone does not solve anything. But the absence of a mechanism for expressing it can have very dire consequences for a country as fragile as Afghanistan.

Even if our original ambitions of playing a role, however small, in the changing history of Afghanistan may not have been met yet, with Open Jirga, we are determined to continue giving a national platform for people like Haleema to have their voices heard.

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Open Jirga: one man’s amazing Afghan journey

2014-10-09T14:32:53+00:00

Abdurrasul Pamiri stunned the studio audience of our discussion programme Open Jirga when he revealed he had travelled eight days from the Pamir Mountains in northern Afghanistan to ask a question.

"Twenty kilometres on foot from my village to the Wakhan district," he explained, "And approximately four days of travel by horse and donkey to get to the Eshkashim district [the first district in the north-east that is connected by roads]."

He then embarked on four "days of travel by car from Eshkashim to Baharak [district] and from there to Faizabad [the provincial capital], then to Kabul". He carried his bed and food with him, travelling during the day and spending the night at mosques.

An ethnic-Kyrgyz Afghan, Pamiri wants the Afghan authorities to pay more attention to his community which lives in a remote corner of the country. As he pointed out on the show, despite living in Afghanistan for centuries, “Afghanistan recognised us [as Afghans] only in the past five or six years."

Rule of law

Pamiri joined the studio audience – which hailed from 72 different districts and represented 17 ethnic groups – for an episode of Open Jirga that focused on the role of the Afghan national police (ANP).

After 13 years of sustained international investment in ANP amounting to billions of dollars, people wanted to discuss a wide range of pressing issues. These included the force’s long term financial viability once international funds dry up, whether the heavily armed police are in danger of being another army in disguise, and the accusations of corruption and abuse of children that plague the force.

The panel who took questions from the audience were all high-level officials. In addition to the current head of ANP, General Mohammad Salim Ehsas, the line-up included three former ministers of the interior - Ali Ahmad Jalalai, Ghulam Mujtaba Patang, Faqir Mohammad Faqir - who were directly responsible for leading the police force, and the former intelligence chief Amrullah Saleh.

The sensitive question of sexual abuse was brought up by Mohammad Kabir from Sar-e Pul province in the north of the country. "Sexual abuse of boys is on the rise in Afghanistan," he said. "My question is to all of you authorities: what did you do during your term and … have you done anything conclusive to stop or decrease sexual abuse?"

The current head of police, General Ehsas was first to answer. He said, "There is no doubt, we cannot deny… the police is involved in some sexual abuse cases." He then told the audience the authorities "are confronting this evil phenomenon" and said that police had made "13 cases of arrest" related to sexual abuse when he was the head of security for Balkh province.

At this point Mohammad Kabir responded that abusers were often only arrested for fighting amongst themselves, rather than the more serious crime of sexual abuse. "When there is a disagreement among the people who are committing sexual abuse, they fight," he said. "[It's only] then the police arrest them."

Former intelligence chief Amrullah Saleh, meanwhile, added his opinion: "Now, instead of recognising the police force as the only source for solving the problem of sexual abuse, one should ask why are the Uelma [religious scholars], who constitute a body that is five times larger than the police force, silent about this subject?" He said "the first institution that should rise against this evil phenomenon [should be] the mosque."

Pamiri – who travelled for so many days in such hard conditions – wanted to ask something even more basic. . "The police don’t spend more than two days in the Pamir [mountains] due to cold," he said, and asked for more attention to be paid to the very poor people living in his remote corner of Afghanistan.

Another member of the audience picked up on Pamiri’s comment and asked when and how Afghanistan would have a police force that was truly national in scope.

To which the head of the ANP, General Ehsas, replied, "It is true that all of the people of Afghanistan are waiting [to get a truly national police]. Our senior leaders in the interior ministry and his Excellency the President are working day and night to make sure our security forces are strengthened. In the last 13 years, we have had to start from scratch - a lot of positive work has already happened."

After the recording – and before he embarked on yet another arduous journey back home – Pamiri said, "My heart leaped with joy" at being able to share "my problems with government authorities!"

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Open Jirga: one man’s amazing Afghan journey

2014-09-18T07:10:14+00:00

Rule of law

Another member of the audience picked up on Pamiri’s comment and asked when and how Afghanistan would have a police force that was truly national in scope.

After the recording – and before he embarked on yet another arduous journey back home – Pamiri said, "My heart leaped with joy" at being able to share "my problems with government authorities!"

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"Please make sure we are no longer killed for political reasons"

2014-06-04T08:23:48+00:00

"Sir, I have a request. As a future president of Afghanistan, please make sure we are no longer killed for political reasons. Let us die our natural deaths.”

This is how Afzal Khan Katawazi, a young man from Kabul, voiced his weariness at the lack of security which most people feel in Afghanistan. He was among over 100 people from different walks of life who were invited to ask questions on a recent episode of our TV and radio debate show Open Jirga.

This special episode was devoted to a debate between the audience and the two presidential hopefuls who are facing each other in the second round of this momentous election. (Watch a ten-minute clip of the programme with English subtitles and the full show in Dari and Pashto on YouTube.)

The contenders for the run-off this month – Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former World Bank economist, and former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah – were both invited. But Abdullah Abdullah declined, saying he had no plans to take part in any debate.

Tough questions

Open Jirga was the first show in Afghanistan to suggest a debate between the two.

But the absence of one candidate meant there was more pressure on me as the chair to maintain balance and to make sure that Mr Ghani’s answers did not go unchallenged.

I knew supporters of both candidates would be watching us very carefully and scrutinising every single word. But I felt confident that as long as we kept in mind the BBC’s guidelines about impartiality, it would result in a tough but fair debate.

It was certainly a fiery one: every single member of the studio audience wanted to ask questions or have their say – and those who did get the chance to talk often asked multiple questions in one go.

One of them was a white-bearded man from northern Sar-e-Pul province, Haji Abdul Ghafar Balooch.

After he made his first point, I encouraged the next person to speak.

“I got this chance by my rudeness and pushiness, so now I have two more questions,” was the swift – and rather abrupt – answer from Mr Balooch!

Urgent issues

In fact, all the audience were eager to question Mr Ghani on issues ranging from corruption to unemployment, from the lack of higher education opportunities to the most overriding concern of all - security.

It was an issue that was raised one way or the other in every episode of our special series of Open Jirga before the election.

And it was no different on this occasion too: while approximately 7 million Afghans took part in the first round of voting on 5 April despite Taliban threats, the second round is happening at the peak of the so-called fighting season and there’s great concern the warmer weather may offer the Taliban more of a chance to disrupt the polls.

Mr Ghani responded, “You simply want peace. You want an end to this war. I promise to work wholeheartedly for bringing peace and stability to this land.”

Ethnic anxieties

Interestingly, however, there was an additional major concern that was repeatedly voiced by the audience: the risks posed by ethnic divisions.

For example, Nematullah from the northern province of Samangan said, “This nation is anxious. All these people who have come here represent the nation. They are worried that this is a scenario of north-south division. But what we want is not to hear the sound of war anymore … We want all our ethnical groups, Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras, Turkmen, Baluchis, Pashaees and others, to live side by side in a united Afghanistan.”

Ogei, a young Pashtun woman from the south eastern province of Khost also asked: “My question is about differences among ethnic groups. What is your plan for establishing national unity?”

Mr Ghani joined the audience to applaud the questioner and then tried to assure them that this was not a matter of concern: “This nation has a real national unity. You should take pride in the fact that no ethnic group in Afghanistan has ever raised the slogan of separation,” he replied.

Strong response

Another worried member of the audience, Haji Nader from the volatile southern province of Helmand, suggested that a deal between the two candidates may be a solution: “People are in fear. Will it not be good that you two form a coalition [government] and therefore relieve people from this fear and anxiety?”

Mr Ghani answered: “We are different. We have different points of view, different ways of management, different professional experience and we’re different in the way we accept responsibility. You should decide [between us].”

The run-off is planned to take place on 14 June.

Ensuring a lasting peace and maintaining security and stability will no doubt top the list of challenges that the next president will have to face.

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Afghan elections: a battle between fear and hope

2014-04-04T09:52:40+00:00

Since the departure of the Taliban regime in late 2001, experts on Afghanistan have been saying every year has been a critical year for the country. Often for very good reasons. But the significance of 2014 can hardly be exaggerated. Partly it’s because this year will see the end of international assistance in key areas. But mainly because it will bear witness to what will hopefully be the first ever peaceful democratic transfer of power in Afghanistan's history.

Afghanistan's war-weary people are, therefore, caught between fear and hope – feelings which have been clear to see in a special series of our TV and radio debate show Open Jirga dedicated to the elections.

The seven shows brought people from all 34 provinces of Afghanistan face to face with politicians, election commissioners and presidential candidates to debate the issues.

In feedback after the show, one audience member told us, "It was a completely new way of approaching officials. We have never experienced such a chance to see and meet presidential candidates and tell them our problems in the provinces."

Seventy eight per cent of those who responded to our questions after taking part also said they were positive that the show would make leaders more accountable to the people.

Key issues

Unsurprisingly, one of the biggest issues brought up by the audience was security. In one episode, Sharifa Ahmadzai from Helmand, for instance, asked: "There are a lot of insecure areas in our provinces. Would this insecurity not lead to fraud [in the elections]?"

Mohammad Sarwar from Ghor asked about plans to "secure the roads between provincial centres and the surrounding districts" which, he said, "have been insecure for the last 10, 11 years".

In response, presidential hopeful Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai said his first step would be to ask the armed forces to report every eight hours on the security situation to the President, and create a "reward and punishment" mechanism for people responsible for specific roads who would take "assertive action against criminality".

Another contender, Abdullah Abdullah responded that "attracting public cooperation was the main issue" and that he would strengthen the intelligence and judicial systems and police's ability to respond rapidly to ensure road security.

Worry about electoral fraud was articulated by the audience in every programme.

For instance, one audience member from the central highlands said "in many areas people stop women, in the name of tradition, from going to polling stations and they themselves use their cards to vote for their preferred candidates".

Other major issues were the track record of candidates or their running mates – particularly when it came to their role in the 1990s civil war and human rights violations – and the future role of Sharia law in the country.

Women's role in the elections was also put under the spotlight in one special show, which saw a lively debate about the absence of a female presidential candidate and what stops women voting, including the remoteness of polling stations as well as religious and cultural barriers. (For more on this show, read a blog from the show's floor manager Tahmina Kargar.)

Turning point

There is, no doubt, a sense of weariness about these elections among the Afghan public. But what also became clear from these shows is the public’s passion - and their understanding of what’s at stake.

Two speakers in particular stand in my mind.

The first was a young woman called Mariam from Sar-e Pul province, who responded with fury when presidential contender Ahmad Shah Ahmadzai commented that he thought voting had before only led to international forces in Afghanistan, a presence he vehemently opposed.

"You encourage me not to vote. Why?" Mariam replied angrily, before defending the hard-won progress in Afghanistan over the last decade.

"In the last 12 years I have studied and graduated from the university. I am happy with Karzai because he brought peace. I have not forgotten 12 years ago when the Taliban were [in power]. Despite wearing the full veil, we used to get whipped in the head. [Please] remember those years... and keep your voting card as safe as your degree [document]."

Her words were met by thunderous applause from the studio audience.

The second memorable speaker was another eloquent, impassioned woman, Marzia from Paktia province.

"I say this as an Afghan and as a mother. We have endured a lot of pain," she said. "We should encourage our people to vote so we can [elect] one person, and then put pressure on them [to deliver]. And if they can’t do [the job] or fails to fulfil his promises, we can then all rise!"

Related links

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Open Jirga: Afghans question President Karzai

2013-03-19T13:50:33+00:00

Early in 2013, Daud Junbish, the presenter of the Open Jirga debate show, was invited for lunch at the Presidential Palace with President Hamid Karzai and a large group of guests. The president suggested a separate meeting, at which he described himself as a 'fan' of Open Jirga. Daud invited him to appear on the show, and he accepted.

This was a massive undertaking in a country where security incidents, including suicide bombings, have become so common. We agreed to avoid President Karzai's name in any correspondence and call this edition of the programme 'Open Jirga on Governance'.

The special episode – featuring the president as the sole guest to debate with the studio audience – was broadcast last night on the BBC language services for Afghanistan in Pashto and Dari and on the state broadcaster, Radio Television Afghanistan (RTA)’s, radio and TV channels. (For a slideshow from the night, click here)

It was an extraordinary experience to bring 70 men and women from all corners of the country to Kabul without telling them who was going to take their questions. Only once inside the Palace entrance was the identity of the guest revealed.

It was not difficult to see the sense of nervousness, disbelief and excitement all mixed up. The team needed to do longer warm up sessions than usual to get the questions flowing.

Audience questions covered a wide range of topics including President Karzai’s performance over the last decade, Afghanistan’s relationship with the international community and the US, the rule of law, infrastructure and peace with the Taliban.

In response to a question on corruption, the president said: "There is no doubt that administrative corruption exists in Afghanistan. But if you wish that the President should announce that corruption should be stopped, and it would be stopped, this is not how it works. Corruption is a social problem, it is hidden. It can be stopped by strengthening institutions and by reforming regulations."

While Afghan people have met with President Karzai and other senior policy makers over the years, they tend to have this access because they are well-connected and from urban centres.

Our Open Jirga audiences set a new precedent because they represent the broadest possible cross section of Afghan society. For Monday's special episode, we brought together an audience from some of the poorest and most remote parts of the country.

It was a unique opportunity for people who are otherwise voiceless in the national context to sit face-to-face with their president. The audience included teachers and lawyers as well as local cobblers, community elders, housewives, farmers, shopkeepers, tailors, drivers, bakers, and butchers.

A member of the audience said to the president: "When we voted for MPs we thought they would convey our concerns and issues somewhere but none of them did. They only conveyed the complaints of their relatives, and made them rich, but paid no attention to poor and needy citizens."

Not everyone got the answers they wanted, or even a chance to ask a question. But the atmosphere overall at the end of the show was one of real satisfaction.

When the recording finished, the president took advantage of the secure setting of his compound to mingle with the audience and answer some further questions. In countries like Afghanistan, this normally can't happen – politicians are protected behind numerous layers of thick concrete walls.

Afterwards, the audience chatted with excitement. An audience member from the Faryab provinces who was very concerned about the security situation in his region said: "I feel so light and relieved. I have taken my worry out of my chest and put it directly to the president."

For me, that summed up the purpose of Open Jirga.

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