KANDAHAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan – Military and civilian officials from the Kandahar Provincial Reconstruction Team met with the senior leaders of the 2nd Battalion, 8th Field Artillery Regiment, and the Daman District Support Team to discuss governance, security and development issues at Camp Nathan Smith on July 24.
The Kandahar PRT regularly meets with battle space owners and DSTs, made up of civilians from the U.S. State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.S, Department of Agriculture to discuss ways to connect the district government upward toward the provincial government and downward to the towns, villages and citizens to improve district governance and capacity.
The Daman District is led by Governor Haji Ahmed, who has run the district for the last seven years. “He is very adept at getting his district involved in the provincial government to get things done,” said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Sean Bateman, the commander of the 2nd Battalion, 8th Field Artillery Regiment, from Fairbanks, Alaska.
The Daman District lies to the east and south of Kandahar City and contains Kandahar Airfield. The district topography is dominated by mountains the north and desert in the south. The bulk of the district’s approximately 74,000 people live in the north along Highways One and Four.
“Security-wise, not much is going on,” said Bateman. “[The insurgents] do not attack the Afghan National Police, and they don’t attack us. The biggest threat is indirect fire against Kandahar Airfield. The enablers we have, like civil affairs, are what Daman needs.”
The district governor holds shuras every week with municipal leaders and elders from throughout the district with little tribal tension.
“The shuras are always well attended, so there is a connection there,” said Bateman. “The governor will have an agenda, and they will work through it.”
A recent issue the district governor is trying to address is to how to increase the skilled labor force in the public health and education sectors.
“The governor was actively seeking women’s names that he can nominate to send to school [in Kandahar City] to become nurses and midwifes,” said U.S. Army Capt. Angela Chipman, an administrative officer from Williamsburg, Iowa.
“Some schools are closed right now because there are not the teachers we need in Daman,” said Bronwyn Jones, a Daman District Support Team official with USAID from Bronx, N.Y.
Besides efforts to increase skilled labor, the government in Daman has initiatives in the creation of a vocational center to help former insurgents learn marketable skills, the completion of a 10 kilometer road being built by the Central Asia Development Group, and agriculture and veterinary improvements.
“The governor would like to see improvements, and it is something we can definitely work on with his staff,” said Jones. “This is certainly a case where we connect the district to the provincial government and national government.”
“I am very impressed with the district governor, and for a long time, he was doing this without ISAF partners,” said Bateman. “But he knows we are eventually leaving, and he wants to make sure his district is ready.”
| Date Taken: | 07.24.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 07.28.2011 00:37 |
| Story ID: | 74422 |
| Location: | KANDAHAR, AF |
| Web Views: | 276 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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