In a country where already millions of Afghans are facing more challenges and the future is dark, here in the remote communities people don’t know where the next meal comes from and how they will continue to live. Since September 2023, hundreds of thousands Afghan families have returned from the neighboring countries. Although, the active conflict is no longer the primary driver of displacement. Shabana a 35-year-old, mother of five children shares her story of immigration from Pakistan.
At her home in Nangarhar, the province in eastern Afghanistan, Shabana shared her story of deportation from Pakistan. I am from Pakistan, I got married with Afghan family in my hometown. I was happy with my family and we earned some to eat. Since Pakistan government issued an order that all undocumented Afghans should be deported till the end of 2023. We were also deported to Afghanistan without anything, we had nothing to live life. Now, we are at the risk of hunger, my husband is disabled, he can’t work, he is always hangry to me and his kids and he always hits us, said Shaban.
Shabana also said, “When we came to Jalalabad, the first days were very bad, I would be very disappointed, I was crying, thinking of my kids and disabled husband, I couldn’t see my kids wearing the old shoes and clothes, they were collecting plastics and bottles in the street and then selling ang bringing home some dry bread to eat, my sons are 8–10-year-old and my three daughters are small, I see other kids going to school and playing among themselves, I and my husband just not seeing them”.
VDO supported Shabana and 15 other women in providing them psycho-social counseling services to help them survive and rebuild their mental and emotional well-being, and regain the confidence to continue back.
This program was very vital for me, I and other women were mentally broken, and hopeless, we were ready to kill ourselves, through the counseling program, we started to believe in ourselves again. We can now look ahead, not back, and we are learning how to rebuild our life, and we have also received food, dignity kits, hygiene kits and household items, said Shabana.
I am a tailor, but I don’t have sewing-machine to support my family financially and help my kids attending school so, I need a sewing-machine, and for my husband, if he has a small business at my home to sell popcorn, sweet and other things, it will be very good to stand by our own feet and continue our normal life.
VDO has started Psycho-Social Counseling Program in the eastern, Nangarhar, Afghanistan to support Afghan returnees both financially and mentally to survive and back to their normal life.
