Ghani praises ‘no more baad marriages’

Monitoring Desk

KHOST CITY: President Ashraf Ghani has said giving daughters under baad marriage has reached zero level in Khost, which indicates cultural advancement in the southeastern province.

Meeting women in Khost City, the provincial capital, President Ghani ordered the local mayor to hand over the women park’s responsibility to women.

He also directed Khost governor to pave the ground for women’s businesses in the park.

At the meeting, women shared their problems and suggestions with the president about various issues particularly plaguing education, health, women’s economic situation and violence against women.

Governor Hakam Khan Habibi said 330,000 students including 100,000 boys and 230,000 girls currently attended schools in Khost.

He said a program for economic improvement of women had been launched, so far covering 500 families. “This program is expanding”.

Malalai Wali, Khost women’s affairs director, said she was happy about the president’s trip and thanked him for his special attention to women’s issues.

She said currently 1,000 women worked in different healthcare centers and the level of violence against the gender had declined by 30 percent as well as Baad marriages had dropped reduced to zero, compared to last years.

She suggested there were 6,700 women’s councils in Khost and donor organizations should be encouraged to implement long-term and short-term projects for them to improve their economic situation.

Responding to their suggestions and demands, the president called it “a great news” that hundreds of thousands of girls went to school in Khost and the level of Baad marriages had zeroed, something he described as cultural development.

“We pay special attention for women’s economic improvement, the Citizen Charter Program would cover all districts of Khost for projects and women would be given special share,” he said.

He said efforts were underway for rehabilitation of pine nuts forests and the nuts’ processing as well as walnuts and olive gardens would be also created, a process in which women could participate.

Ghani ordered the higher education minister to pay special attention to provinces where women were given a low share in education scholarships and assess Khost’s Sheikh Zayed University for launching post graduation classes.