KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — In elements of Afghanistan the place there are not any road names or home numbers, utility corporations and their clients have adopted a artistic strategy for connecting. They use mosques as drop factors for payments and money, a “pay and pray” system.
Now the nationwide postal service desires to part this out by placing mailboxes on each road throughout the nation, a part of a plan to modernize a service lengthy challenged by paperwork and battle.
The lofty aspirations embrace introducing entry to procuring through e-commerce websites and issuing debit playing cards for on-line purchases. Will probably be a leap in a rustic the place a lot of the inhabitants is unbanked, air cargo is in its infancy and worldwide courier corporations don’t ship even to the capital, Kabul.
The modifications imply Afghans can pay larger service charges, a problem as greater than half the inhabitants already depends on humanitarian help to outlive.
The Afghan Publish, like a lot of the nation, nonetheless does every little thing on paper. “No one makes use of e mail,” mentioned its enterprise improvement director, Zabihullah Omar. “Afghanistan is a member of the Common Postal Union, however after we examine ourselves to different international locations it’s at a low stage and within the early levels.”
The postal service has 400 to 500 branches throughout the nation and is vital for finishing administrative duties like acquiring a passport or driver’s licence. It distributes as much as 15,000 passports each day.
One other widespread service is the certification of paperwork for admission to larger training or abroad establishments. The principle Kabul department has devoted counters for it together with VIP lanes and a women-only space.
Publish places of work in Afghanistan are important for ladies eager to entry companies or merchandise they’d in any other case be denied, since they’re usually barred from getting into ministries or different official premises.
However the spectre of the Taliban’s edicts concentrating on girls and women additionally looms on the Afghan Publish.
On the entrance to the primary Kabul department, an indication tells girls to appropriately put on hijab, or the Islamic headband. One image exhibits a girl with a crimson cross over her seen face. The opposite has a inexperienced examine mark over the face as a result of solely her eyes are seen.
One girl visiting the department was a 29-year-old medical graduate from western Farah province, who gave her title as Arzo. The Training Ministry wouldn’t let her in and dispatched her to the publish workplace as an alternative to get paperwork completed.
She wished to get her paperwork licensed, a sensible measure amid the nation’s precarious financial scenario and the sweeping restrictions on girls and women.
“Something can occur at any time,” she mentioned. “There are not any jobs. There are a lot of issues.”
It was her first time utilizing a publish workplace. She paid 640 afghanis, or $9, for every doc and known as the charges too excessive.
A extra glad buyer was 22-year-old Alam Noori from jap Paktika province who got here to gather his passport. “Piece of cake,” he mentioned in English. Prior to now, he additionally used a publish workplace to gather his driver’s license.
“I got here to know in regards to the publish workplace by means of social media,” he mentioned. “Individuals within the metropolis use it loads as a result of they know it, however these in villages and districts aren’t.”
The Afghan Publish’s enterprise improvement director, Omar, desires companies to be simpler for individuals however conceded that it’ll take time.
“In most authorities businesses, individuals are wandering from public service to public service, so I need to serve individuals right here, and that makes me very glad,” he mentioned. “There’s a want for a publish workplace wherever there’s a inhabitants.”
That’s the place the plan to have a mailbox on each road is available in. They are going to be for paying payments, sending mail and submitting paperwork for processing.
However handwritten letters are disappearing, as they’re in lots of elements of the world.
Hamid Khan Hussain Khel is among the nation’s 400 postmen, zipping across the capital on a motorbike bearing Afghan Publish’s jaunty blue and yellow. However he has but to ship a private letter, regardless of serving town’s inhabitants of 5 million for 2 years. He cited the recognition of smartphones and messaging apps.
He enjoys the work, which is much less harmful than it was through the decades-long battle.
“Once we meet individuals, their satisfaction makes us glad,” he mentioned. “I haven’t seen an individual not smile once they get their paperwork.”
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