January 16th, 2025
Dear friends,
January 17 was a lucky day for OFARIN. We learned that € 50,000, which we had sent on October 25th (!) from our account at Sparkasse Mainfranken to our account at Kabul Azizi Bank, had been released. The money goes through several intermediary banks. One of them, located in Italy, checks on behalf of the EU whether this transfer is not money laundering or whether the money is perhaps going to terrorists. As a bank customer, all you notice at first is that the money is not arriving. Our colleagues in Kabul finally made enquiries at Azizi Bank. Azizi Bank had received a request from the Italian bank. They had to prove where the money was from, where it was going to and what it was to be used for. When our employees presented contracts with the Ministries of Education and Agriculture as supporting documents, the bankers advised against using these documents because the EU inspectors considered the Afghan government and its officials to be Taliban – i.e. terrorists. Instead, our colleagues submitted payrolls for our teachers and contracts with tribal representatives on whose territory we wanted to plant trees. They were written in the local language. Radio silence followed. Finally, we wrote to Sparkasse Mainfranken. Within ten days, we were asked to answer the questions in English. And we did. Then there was silence again. Finally, we got in touch with a gentleman who deals with complaints about money transactions with oriental countries for the savings bank association. He managed to explain to the Italians that checks are justified, but that they shouldn’t take three months. The money was released and is in Kabul.
We had stopped paying wages there. The rooms where we hold classes were not heated. In Dzadzi Maidan in Khost province, 570 men had dug pits in which we wanted to plant trees. These desperately poor men usually make baskets, ropes and brooms in winter. This year, they had dug pits for us instead, but received nothing in return. Our employees were only busy placating and putting off people to whom we owed money.
Haibatullah is a regular source of further annoyance. He is the emir and therefore also the head of state of Afghanistan. Haibatullah has a keen sense of the dangers posed by women. Now women are no longer allowed to enter the offices of aid organizations. If a woman is seen in the office of an aid organization, the organization is shut down. But our girls‘ classes must be taught by female teachers. This requires strict gender segregation, which is very important to the Emir. We have asked the ministries how these regulations can be reconciled. They are at a loss. The absurdity will probably lead to the closure of some aid organizations. After that, solutions will be found that are somehow practicable.
As you can see, we are constantly confronted with threats to our existence. Eurocrats are turning the commonplace word “terrorist” into a pop dance and strangling the flow of the elixir on which we live – money. Then a meeting with a female colleague can trigger our expulsion from Afghanistan. But we are determined to stay there. They need us there right now. And if times change in Afghanistan, OFARIN can offer a lot that will help Afghanistan. If we went home now, a new start under better circumstances would be much more difficult than if we were able to build something new in due course with experienced staff using existing material and experience.
The size of the walnut tree plantations and the quality of their implementation are unparalleled in Afghanistan. The school lessons and the work of the midwives are also unparalleled in Afghanistan. This is only possible because OFARIN’s Afghan staff are able to design their own programs and implement them to a high standard. Unlike so many Afghans, they are not driven by their own reputation or that of their families. They are concerned about the future of their fellow citizens and their country. I admire the far-sighted and understanding way our people treat each other and their partners. These partners also include representatives of the authorities, with whom cooperation is no cherry on top. This team, with its professional expertise and interpersonal skills, is an inspiring role model for its fellow countrymen and has the potential to achieve much more.
After this hymn of praise for our Afghan colleagues, a bit of technical information: we have sent out the donation receipts for 2024. If one of you is waiting for this and has not yet received anything, it may be because the tax office does not require you to provide donation receipts for donations up to € 300. For donations up to € 300, the tax office is happy with a simple bank statement, a booking confirmation of the bank transfer or a deposit slip. Lazy as we are, you will generally not receive a donation receipt from us if you have donated € 300 or less. Of course, we sometimes make mistakes and don’t send you a receipt even though you have transferred more than € 300. You may also have lost your payment slip. Then please write to us! We will then issue you with a receipt.
Kind regards,
Peter Schwittek