Writer: Liaqat Saei
Caution: This article is a narration of the responsibility and struggle of an Afghan woman for the development of her country, the results of efforts which are ruined now, and the woman herself has no place to stay in the country for which struggled a lot.
Part One:
Period of the Ministry of Energy and Water and the first days of the presidency in the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs
I saw her at a workshop entitled (Anti-Corruption Training) for the first time which was organized by the Administrative Reform and Civil Service Commission. A girl with hazel eyes, middle height, round face, pride, and special grandeur that was quite evident in her manner. It was interesting to have the only girl with such a character in that group of fifty or sixty men, each of whom came together on behalf of a government agency, but even more interesting was her highly competitive motivation and questioning mind, which she always challenges the institute’s professors and instructors during the workshop especially when the subject was equality between men and women or equal empowerment of men and women. When the only girl in our meeting was speaking and arguing, the rest of the members were either silent or conservative, cautiously, uttered a few short sentences, and soon cut off their mikes, fearing that, willingly or unwillingly, they might say something about the weakness of women and challenge Khaterah Yusufi. In those days, she not only defended the rights and empowerment of women, but she was equally prejudiced towards the youth and young capacities of Afghanistan. Although it is possible that in such a masculine environment, the only girl in the crowd would get all the attention because she was not just a “girl”, she was a rebellious fighter, a very conscientious employee, and a completely fearless critic. She looked directly into the eyes of the professors there and respectfully recounted their problems and mistakes as if she was talking to them in a quiet room. The existence of these characteristics and of course her unique beauty and sobriety made my mind more involved with this lady than usual during 2 years. Finally, we got married on the 21st of March 2021.
Before our marriage, during our acquaintance and engagement, we both worked in similar positions as (General Manager of Contract Facilitation) in the Ministries of Energy and Water and Interior. It was a very responsible and stressful job. Although it is often believed that the engagement period is the sweetest and most exciting period of the young couple’s life. But this period was a little sweeter for us because we were most involved in stress in addition to the sweetness and excitement. The stress of not providing police salaries on time, the stress of police stations falling and repairing them, the stress of flooding a sea and not building a dam quickly, the stress of not building a checkpoint, the stress of not finalizing a dam, the stress of not handling fuel on time, police clothing, stress, stress, and stress….
I read somewhere that when we are worried and stressed about something if we talk about it with someone, the intensity of worry and stress decreases. Well, we did the same thing. On weekends, when it was our only chance to meet, we would spend the weekend at Pole Sorkh without exception. We wanted to enjoy our “sweet” engagement period, but after several hours of talking, we realized that during this time we only shared our stresses. We did because our minds were so busy with work issues that as soon as we started talking, our discussion would inadvertently go in the same direction, and if we wanted to change the subject, she would say with a smile; “We sacrificed ourselves to keep them alive,” pointing to young girls and boys drowning in their love.
We were discussing as if we were in the meetings, there was no romantic talk. When it was time to say goodbye, she kept the stress of the Ministry of Interior along with the work stress of the Ministry of Energy and Water and me, the stress of the Ministry of Energy and Water on the problems of the Ministry of Interior so we both said goodbye with very busy minds. The problem was that she was very perfectionist and expected everything to go perfectly, on time, which was impossible in government offices.
The day we got married, a month was passed since she was president at the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, and I was in the process of being hired as an advisor to the Minister in the Finance and Procurement Department of the Ministry of Refugees. Although based on our rights and qualifications we could use our annual legal leave and be away from work for a month as a wedding leave, at her insistence, we took only five days off. We decided to spend this period away from work discussion and workspace but she refused to turn off the official number of her work. She said that maybe there will be a problem that the employees will not be able to solve, then the work of the people will be stopped. Less than two days after our wedding, her phone rang one after the other, and there was a problem after another until on the fourth day she was exhausted and said: “It is not possible, I have to go to the office myself.” She went to the office with signs of wedding makeup after four days and backed home with a lot of proposals at night.
To be continued…
Translated by: Ali Rezaei
