Hope Journeys Kabul Nov 2003

Mar Jan left Afghanistan for Iran to make enough money to marry. In Iran he became a heroin addict so he couldn't return to Afghanistan. Instead he went to Peshawar in Pakistan. ‘I was useless. I had dirty shoes, dirty clothes, and no one would let me into their home. I slept under a bridge for eight years and would eat thrown away food. Once I was accused of stealing and a policeman beat me on my head with his gun…There was no place for me to go… and no-one to help me except God….’

NEJAT  (a Persian, Pushtu & Urdu word meaning freedom, salvation, deliverance) started work in 1991. In Hayyatabad, Peshawar it provided a 20 bed facility for harm-reduction, detoxification and rehabilitation.

‘With a waiting list of over 3000, the centre provides residential care for 240 addicts each year, through its 3 stages of Reception - 2 months of preparation aimed at self motivation and harm reduction, Residential - 4 weeks detoxification, counselling and education, and Re-integration - one year follow up including job placement support’

ORA Annual Report 1999 ‘Hope Journeys’

This is the programme I used to work with as Drug Advisor, helping with the staff training and development programme.

The work expanded in four districts of remote Badakhshan, NE Afghanistan - Sheghnan, Ishkashem, Zebak and Wakhan. I was always impressed with the dedication of the Afghan staff, who walked overland to the centres for a fortnight and then spent a year in primitive conditions, often in extreme cold, dedicated to serving their people. When we went we drove 4 wheel-drives for 2 days to get there. A journey I will never forget. Refugee camp based detoxification programmes – in Khorasan, Jalozai and Akora Khattak - were also set up for women and children unable to attend a residential establishment. I remember visiting Uzbeks families who were re-establishing carpet weaving to break out of the poverty trap of addiction.
Over 10 years NEJAT treated around 9000 addicts including women and children, (c 4000 beneficiaries in Pakistan and c 5000 in Afghanistan). The work of the Nejat Centre Peshawar (1991-96) was externally evaluated and the report ‘Nejat the first 5 years’ suggests an impressive 2/3-success rate (66%) -very high in this field.

The NEJAT director on horse-back in remote Afghanistan

Qasim, the Director, is an ex Mujahhadin commander who fought against the Russians and is now fighting a war on Drugs. He has doggedly lead and built up a team of Afghans who are helping their own people tackle this debilitating problem. With increasing funding problems the programme has been run more and more on a voluntary basis. As I look back I am struck by the overwhelming needs, extremes conditions, high staff commitment, which contribute to the uniqueness of the project. They are helping to create civil society through the various tribal groups co-operating in the programme- Pathans, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras, Afghans and Pakistanis together. No mean achievement in an increasingly fragmented society.

Now the work has shifted to Kabul and the other centres closed down. It is a new phase. It almost feels like the old has died and they are starting all over again. But Nejat continued to make a significant contribution to rebuilding lives and thus rebuilding Afghanistan. Hope journeys on.

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Mar Jan was helped by NEJAT workers who met him under the bridge and invited him to become a friend (‘dost’): ‘I couldn’t believe it, how could they be friends with someone like me. The smell from my head wound was so bad that no one could be around me. I went with my new friends and they made me have a bath, they dressed my head wound and cleaned out the lice, and I was admitted into their rehabilitation centre…. Now I am well and my head injury is completely healed. I am working as a volunteer at the NEJAT centre. My previous drug user friends do not even recognize me. They think that Mar Jan died'

from your own correspondence

NEJAT, Kabul, Nov 2003
(and Peshawar 1996-98)

A recent Times article on Nejat can be found on the BBC website

Afghanistan's home-grown drug problem

By Andrew North BBC correspondent in Kabu