Teacher Hadia Ahmadi (pseudonym) lost her job after the Taliban invaded the Afghan capital last August. He is now 43 years old. In the freezing cold, Hadia Ahmadi sits on the side of the road in Kabul and now polishes her shoes. He is trying to run his family with the meager income from there.
Afghanistan is in a dire humanitarian and economic crisis as foreign aid has been cut off since the Taliban came to power. Millions of people are starving as the fragile economy collapses. As a result, even the once affluent middle class families in the country have become destitute.
The World Food Program (WFP) has warned that more than half of Afghans are at risk of starvation. 3 million children in the country are now suffering from malnutrition.
Hadia, a mother of five, said, ‘When I saw that my children could not eat, I started polishing shoes.
Hadia has been teaching for a decade. Her husband worked as a cook in a private company. One of his daughters was working as a clerk in a government agency. All in all, they had a well-to-do family. The family was improving a lot. But within a few weeks, disaster struck Hadia’s family.
Hadia lost her job first when the girls’ school was closed indefinitely after the Taliban came. Then her husband and daughter lost their jobs. One of his sons studied computer science. His studies have also stopped as he could not pay the expenses from his family. The family is struggling to provide daily food.
After the Taliban came to power, people were seen selling household items on the streets of Kabul to provide food during the cash crunch. This has become a normal experience for many in ordinary families like Ahmadi. Many people are still trying to survive by eating twice.
Hadia Ahmadi said, “We are starving now. For now, there is no one in our family who can help us all financially. ‘
Hadia said, ‘Some widows are the sole breadwinner of their family. On the other hand, some women want to help their husbands financially. The Taliban must allow women to work outside the home. Of course we have to arrange jobs for them. There is no employment now. ‘
