For displaced families, an Eid without festivity

Families express concern over not being provided ‘special package’ on Eid.

PESHAWAR:

At Khyber Agency’s Jalozai Camp, the displaced families which once celebrated Eidul Azha with customary fete and ritual feel more marooned than ever.

The estimated 17,287 families, which were uprooted during military offensives in different parts of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), expressed concern over not being provided gifts or “special package” by the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) government or any non-governmental organisation (NGOs) this Eid.

“Eid felt like any other day, there was nothing special about it,” said Jan Muhammad Afridi, who has been living at the camp with this family for the past two years. He said that unlike this year’s Eidul Fitr, the government or the NGOs did not distribute gifts among the displaced families, which have been left incapacitated and impoverished after being uprooted from their homes.

“It was only till the evening that some people from the government came to distribute meat among us and we cooked it for supper,” he added.

Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) Spokesperson Adnan Khan confirmed that families at the camp were not given any gifts on Eid. “Earlier on Eidul Fitr, aid agencies distributed clothes, shoes and toys among the families at the camp but they could not offer anything extra this time due to time constraints,” Khan reasoned. He said that the Saudi government has donated meat for the displaced families at Jalozai Camp, adding that it will be distributed among the displaced families at the camp.

Moreover, Al-Khidmat Foundation President Sultan Akbar said the organisation will distribute 4,000 four-kg bags of meat among each displaced family, along with other gifts such as clothes and shoes for men, women and children. He said the foundation, in collaboration with Helping Hand and Chanson, slaughtered 95 cattle and 22 sheep and goats at a cost of Rs6.4 million and distributed their meat amongst the families at the camp.

Sahibud Din, who lives in a rented house in Swato Pathak, said he did not receive meat or gifts from the government or any welfare organisation. “The only meat I got was from my neighbours,” he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 30^th, 2012.